


How to Train Your Fantastic Beasts

by WishUponADragon



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: F/M, How Do I Tag, Tags May Change, literally just stuck the fantastic beasts squad in Berk, more characters might show up, ships may change - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2018-02-01
Packaged: 2018-10-16 20:51:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 22,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10579254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WishUponADragon/pseuds/WishUponADragon
Summary: On the run from MACUSA and most of the world, Newt and company sail north, to a land unexplored and displaced from the changing times of 20th century. Here there be dragons...





	1. Introductions

The small boat rocked slightly with the gentle waves of the open ocean. There was no wind, but the magic that almost tangibly encircled the boat kept it moving at a steady pace. Though a heavy layer of fog surrounded them, Newt was certain he could see the faint outline of a distant shore. 

“Tina! Tina, look!” he called excitedly over his shoulder, perched precariously on the bow. Tina looked up to glare at him before leaning her head back over the edge of the boat. Newt glanced towards her quickly and noted the green tinge around her face before waving Jacob over instead. 

Jacob, slightly less green than Tina, pushed off from the edge and moved to stand behind Newt. Nearly a week at sea from London and the little crew had more or less become accustomed to the sloshing movements of the boat, aside from Tina, who passed the journey mostly in Newt’s case. 

Queenie rubbed her sister’s back while craning her neck to spot what Newt was so enthusiastically looking at. She had told Tina to come out for some fresh air, which in hindsight might not have been as good for her as Queenie had anticipated. 

Jacob squinted into the fog. “Uh, yeah. That sure looks like an island.” He squinted harder, concentration lines appearing around his eyes. He pointed in a bit more specific direction, a little beach nestled between steep cliffs. “Looks like we could make a landing over there.”

After a moment of squinting Newt nodded cheerfully. “Right! That way, Credence,” he called. The boat shifted a few degrees, sail billowing and ropes tightening almost of their own accord. Credence didn’t move from his spot curled up at the stern. He slid a bookmark in the notebook Newt had lent to him and put it in the inner pocket of his coat. 

The boat jolted as it slid onto the sandy bank, momentum carrying it more than halfway out of the water. Newt grabbed his case off the deck below him before he dropped to the ground, his boots sinking into the wet sand. He looked around quickly, taking note of the high cliffs surrounding the little beach, and the dense forest not 20 meters from where he stood. “Well, come on!” 

He marched towards the treeline without looking back to make sure the other four were following. Not that he needed too, Tina had been off the boat as soon as she was sure the water was shallow enough to stand. She trudged out of the ocean, soaking wet and no less ill than before. Queenie met her on the beach with a laugh and slung her arm around her sister’s shoulders. 

“Oh, why did I ever agree to-” Tina began. 

Queenie cut her off with another angelic laugh. “Hey, you could be doing paperwork at MACUSA right now. An adventure with the love of your life isn’t so-”

“Queenie!” Tina hissed through clenched teeth.

Queenie shook her a bit, giggling quietly as they followed Jacob and Credence up the steep beach. “They aren’t listening, honey. Secret’s safe with me.” She winked before taking her arm off Tina and hurrying ahead. Tina groaned and trailed after her dejectedly.

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

“Newt, are we actually going anywhere?” Jacob asked. He leaned against a tree, clearly winded. Most of the now four hour walk had been uphill and Newt and Credence were the only two who still seemed remotely enthusiastic about the whole affair.

Newt paused, a bit puzzled. “Um, well, no. That’s the point of exploring!” He gestured to the space around them. Tina ducked quickly to avoid being hit by his wildly swung case. She straightened with a huff and swept a stray bit of hair out of her eyes.

Queenie threw her hand on her hip. “Newt, I’ve seen that crooked tree over there five times now! We’re going in circles.”

“Maybe, but, isn’t this interesting though? For example,” he pointed to a patch of large bright blue flowers at the base of a tree, “I’ve never seen any plant like that before! It could be a species completely unique to this island!”

The group took a moment to stare at the flowers in question, Credence with wide eyed fascination, Jacob and Queenie with a much milder degree of interest, and Tina with outright exasperation. 

“Newt,” Tina sighed, “those are hibiscus.” 

Newt seemed appalled at the suggestion. “This far north? And no, see, these flowers are all on individual plants, you see, the hibiscus-”

“I thought you were a magizoologist, not a botanist.” Tina crossed her arms, an almost imperceptible smile creeping across her face despite her frustration. 

The challenge threw Newt for a moment and he fixed his gaze firmly on the plants that had brought it about. “Well, yeah, but. Um, you know, got to be able to tell what’s safe for everyone to eat. This here,” he motioned towards the flowers again, “all the color markings on the flowers are warnings best seen by reptiles. So either they’re poisonous to reptiles and possibly other animals, or there’s a similar looking plant growing around here that is.” He glanced in Tina’s direction and nodded once, his ears an intriguing shade of red. “Right. So.” Something in the distance caught his attention. “Oh! Look at that!”

A large plant seemed to smother all the smaller plants it rested on. Newt passed his case to the nearest person, which happened to be Jacob, and crept up to it, completely enthralled. “This part here’s the flower,” he said to no one, as his four companions had unanimously decided to give the thing a much wider berth. “It looks like a modified venus flytrap. See, those have a two way trap, this one’s got three. And it’s so much bigger! The whole plant must be two meters in diameter.” He reached out to touch the flower.

“Hey, uh, didn’t you say it’s like a flytrap? We probably shouldn’t mess with something that size.” Jacob inched closer, his face creasing in concern for his reckless friend.

Newt shrugged off his advice. “No, it’s fine. If the flower’s closed that means something’s already inside it. Won’t be active for a while.” He cupped the flower in his hands and brought it towards his face for a better look. A small pile of bones fell to the ground as the ‘flower’ opened to reveal a mouth with many lines of teeth. A pair of eyes snapped open and fixated on Newt. Startled, he backed a few steps away as three other heads whipped around to look at the group. 

Credence had already drug him by the collar of his coat several feet back by the time it occurred to Newt to shout, “RUN!” Behind them, the creature got to its feet and let loose four streams of fire in their general direction before giving chase to the intruders. 

“No, it’s fine,” Tina repeated mockingly at Newt, though some of the derision was lost in her rush to get away from it. 

“It is, it is!” he said hurriedly. “Wejuststumbledintoitsterritoryandwhenwegetoutsideofitsareait’llleaveusalone!”

“What?” Jacob ask-screamed at him.

“Just keep running!” 

The trip back to the beach went considerably faster than the trip into the jungle. Newt stopped short after breaking out of the treeline. He doubled over trying to catch his breath, and looked up quickly to count his companions, all of whom had continued running towards the boat. “...three, four, five,” Newt touched his coat pocket, “and Pickett.” 

He straightened up and spun around to look for the creature. It had stopped just before it would have to step on the sand. Newt smiled to himself. It's claws were long and thin, and most of its weight seemed to be on the tips of them. He'd guessed that trying to walk on sand would cause it to get stuck, and the creature’s hesitance to follow them onto the beach seemed to confirm it. It snapped at him a few times before slinking out of sight. As it left, it angrily jostled something on its back that Newt was almost certain were wings.

The creature now gone, Newt turned back to his friends, a sudden thought occurring to him. “Five?” he asked, and received five blank stares in return. 

Tina climbed up the beach towards him, her cheeks flushed. “What was that thing? And how did you know it would stop at the be- umhm!” She angrily pushed Newt’s hand off her mouth and glared at him. 

He briefly made eye contact with her, brow furrowed in utter confusion. “Five.” He looked back down the beach. The brown haired boy in leather armor. Newt skidded down the sandy slope, Tina following behind. She kept her lips pursed together tightly. As much as she wanted answers from Newt, she had also realized that their party had grown.

Jacob passed Newt back his case and stood beside him, the group forming a semi-circle around the outsider. The boy nodded solemnly towards them. “I am Hiccup Haddock, chief of Berk. What is your business here?” He looked around at them before apparently deciding that Tina was the leader and stared expectantly at her. 

Tina straightened a bit, trying to project her old auror confidence. “Right. Um, Mr. Haddock, we are... uh, we’re...”

“Dragons?” Queenie bounced a bit closer to Hiccup, making him step back. “No kidding? Wow. And you train them? How many are there, oh!” She grinned in delight but deflated a bit when no one else appeared to match her enthusiasm.

Hiccup took another step away from her. “Ridiculous, no idea where you heard that, but I think you should really go now.” He glanced towards their beached boat. “Did you come here in that?”

“Yes?” Newt replied, also looking at the boat. It was a rather small boat, but with a bit of magic it worked just fine for the five of them. 

Hiccup raised an eyebrow. “You're braver than you look. Come back to the village, you can have a bigger one to go back to wherever it is you came from.” He moved to walk away, but was cut off by Newt running to get in front of him. 

“No, no, wait. Dragons?” He pointed towards Queenie, who was once again grinning.

“Oh, yes. Lots. The plant looking one that chased us is called a Snaptrapper. And, oh, you should see his, he’s beautiful!” Queenie clapped excitedly. “A Nightfury? Ooh, sounds dangerous.”

Now thoroughly concerned, Hiccup turned his full attention back to Queenie. “I don't know how you're doing that, but stop it.”

She nodded and clasped her hands together in front of her. “Sure, sweetie.” After a second she covered her mouth and giggled. “Toothless is such a sweet name!”

“Stop that!” 

Any impending argument or apology was cut short by the thunderous approach of something large and disruptive through the forest. A black and blue blur swooped over the edge of the cliff and planted itself between Hiccup and the disruption, its red and black tail slowly sweeping behind it. A few birds and hogs raced onto the beach, clearly fleeing. Moments later, a green, two headed, two tailed dragon trampled through the treeline, equipped with two near identical human riders, one on each neck. 

“And stay out!” the first human yelled in a female voice. 

“And don't come back!” the second yelled in a male voice.

The dragon flapped its wings triumphantly. One head snorted and the other released a torrent of sparks at nothing in particular. 

A small light blue dragon covered in grey spikes landed beside Hiccup. “Sorry,” the blonde human perched on it called. “I tried!” She yanked the dragon’s reins upward and the pair dodged out of the way of a much larger red dragon.

The short boy riding it hefted a mace at the group, who had gathered closer to each other amidst the chaos. “Interlopers!” he shouted before being knocked to the ground by a small brown dragon. 

“Sorry, Snotlout,” the brown dragon’s rider said, urging it to get off the fallen rider. The large red dragon snorted and lay down as if to sleep. 

Hiccup sighed and put his head in his hands. “Astrid, what happened?” 

The girl with the light blue dragon swung off it and jogged to stand beside Hiccup. “Fishlegs and I had them chasing a Changewing-” 

“There aren’t Changewings on Berk!” Hiccup interrupted.

Astrid raised her eyebrows at him. “-and Snotlout remembered that there aren’t Changewings on Berk and steered the twins here because he thought Berk was being attacked.”

“And I was right!” Snotlout shouted, standing up and brushing the sand off himself. The large red dragon cracked an eye open and snorted in amusement.

“Yes, Snotlout, Berk is being attacked by a beached... I’d call it a boat but I’m not sure that’s accurate.” Astrid threw a skeptical glance at the watercraft. “How did you get here in that thing?”

After a short exchange of glances with the others Tina answered honestly. “Magic?”

One of the green dragons heads came to hover beside her. “Liar,” its rider grumbled. 

The other head appeared on Tina’s other side. “I bet they’re pirates,” the girl on it yelled.

“They don’t have weapons,” her twin argued, apparently just for the sake of arguing. The two heads of the dragon were quick to attack each other while their riders’ words dissolved into confused hostilities. Tina moved away from them and warily watched the scuffle out of the corner of her eye.

Newt stepped slightly towards Hiccup. “We’re, um, we’re not pirates. My name is Newt Scamander, I’m a magizoologist. My associates and I are, um.” He threw a quick glance at the other four, clearly stuck.

“Exploring!” Queenie finished brightly. She nudged Credence and mimed flipping open a book. He pulled the notebook from his jacket and held it out to Hiccup. “See?” Queenie continued. “We’re looking for magical creatures, so we can document what they look like, and what they eat, and that kind of thing!” She bounced on her toes a bit, staring expectantly at Hiccup while he flicked through the notebook. 

“Right!” Newt continued. “I’ve never seen dragons like these in all my years of traveling.”

“So, if you wouldn’t mind,” Tina waited until Hiccup looked up from the book at her before continuing, “we’d like to stay for a bit, so we can observe the different types of dragons you have on the island.”

Hiccup handed the notebook back to Credence, looking the group over carefully. “There’s well over a hundred dragon species native to this archipelago. We haven’t even finished documenting them all. Could take years.”

“That’s fine,” Jacob said. He shrugged a bit and gave a nervous chuckle. “Got all the time in the world.” 

Hiccup motioned for everyone to head up a thin trail in the cliffside. “Well, you're pretty clearly not armed, so I guess it won't hurt to let you stay for a bit. Anyways, you're not going back out to sea in that.”

Snotlout pushed his way in between Hiccup and the newcomers. “I still don’t trust them.” He jabbed his mace in their general direction. “They could be working with Viggo, or Dagur, or-” 

He was cut off by Astrid’s far too calm reasoning. “If they are working with our enemies, then they should already know how dangerous it is to betray Berk.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a walk through the woods with dragons!

The village of Berk, as it turned out, was on nearly the exact opposite end of the island of Berk than they’d landed on. 

They passed the Snaptrapper again, and it snarled at them until Hiccup produced an eel from his vest and waved it around. The dragon retreated with a whimper and the rest of the trip passed more or less uneventfully. 

A few tiny brightly colored dragons flew by overhead. Terrible Terrors, according to Fishlegs. Fishlegs spent the vast majority of the trip excitedly telling the newcomers about his dragon, Meatlug. Consequently, the other dragon riders spent the vast majority of the trip groaning. 

The twins cut him off him on occasion to brag about Barf and Belch. Snotlout, after asserting that Hookfang was the best dragon, and that anything anyone said to the contrary was out of jealousy, attempted to talk over Fishlegs and the twins to tell rather dubious stories about the mighty Jorgenson family. Queenie kept feeding him questions to keep the stories coming while Jacob eventually managed to get Fishlegs to tell him a bit about the other dragons that traveled with them. Credence, unsure who to talk to, hung towards the back of the group, keeping everyone and their dragons in his line of vision.

Astrid, for her part, seemed ready to murder every noise-maker in the group, though she was happy enough to tell Tina all about Stormfly when she asked. The small dragon was apparently incredibly fast as well as poisonous from snout to tail, and Astrid wouldn’t have her any other way. 

Newt broke away from the main group to trail directly behind Hiccup. Aside from a few cautions about hazards in the road, the chief had kept quiet. His dragon wasn’t the biggest, and didn’t appear the most dangerous, but Newt could see that it had the calm confidence to match any Hungarian Horntail. Whatever this dragon was, it was surely the apex predator of the island.

Nightfury, Queenie had called it. It was the deepest, loveliest shade of black Newt had ever seen, and he could almost swear that the blue ridges on its back glowed. Its scales gleamed, probably freshly polished by human hands. The saddle it wore was perfectly tailored to it, and one of the stirrups connected to the red fin on its tail. It surely couldn’t fly without someone who understood how to work the fin, and the stirrup was so strangely shaped...

Newt glanced at their guide, and sure enough, where his right foot ought to have been was a prosthesis that perfectly fit the stirrup. Hiccup had to be the only person who’d be able to ride the Nightfury, Toothless, Queenie had said. They were as close as Newt imagined a person and beast could be. Even on the ground, the pair walked in step. Newt’s caution slowly ebbed to wonder. Despite being muggles, these people obviously cared about their magical creatures far more than the wizarding community even bothered to pretend to. Perhaps the lack of their own magic made magical creatures all the more intriguing? 

Toothless seemed to notice Newt’s eyes fixed on him and swung his head to stare with his own cat like emerald eyes. Newt quickly looked to the creature’s wings instead. They were obviously large when in flight, but now were folded tightly up against its back. They fit comfortably around the saddle, evidence that it was well adjusted to having the saddle on. Toothless turned back towards Hiccup.

Newt didn’t have time to brace himself before Toothless’s tail smacked him hard on the back and sent him stumbling forward. The dragon let out a sound that Newt recognized as its version of laughter. It was similar to the sound Dougal made when he played hide and seek. 

Newt gripped his case hard to his chest to avoid dropping it and doubled over to catch his breath. Hiccup stopped, horrified. “Are you okay? I’m sorry, he doesn’t usually...” He trailed off when he realized that Newt was laughing. 

“Ah, yes, I’m fine.” He threw an amused glance at Toothless as he straightened up. “Playful fellow, at least he knows his own strength. I swear, sometimes I think Susan forgets she’s an Enrumpt.” 

Hiccup apparently did not follow this line of thinking, though Toothless seemed to. The dragon snickered softly and gently batted Newt’s leg with its tail. “That’s, that’s really not funny,” Newt tried telling the dragon, though the message was undermined by intermittent giggling. Tina quietly put her wand away, hoping that it went unnoticed.

“Um, okay then...” Hiccup shook his head. “Anyways, the village is just up ahead.” He stopped at the crest of the next hill and stepped to the side so the newcomers could see. 

They stood in shock, five sets of wide eyes struggling to take in the entire scene. The village sat on a row of cliffs, all dropping sharply to the sea hundreds of feet below. Fishermen in rowboats sat on the water and directed dragons, the same kind as Hookfang, to dive with nets that came up overflowing with fish. One such dragon was dangling from a tree with a smallish rider clinging to its incredibly large horns. A dragon that looked similar to Meatlug dozed in front of a giant blazing forge. Children in the town square hung off the horns and slid down the wings of a big dragon that sat patiently while a woman stroked its head. 

The dragon riders exchanged expressions of pride at the newcomers’ wonder before Hiccup took off down the hill at a sprint. 

He skidded to a stop in front of the woman and began talking to her before anyone else managed to catch up. The dragon beside her shook itself and the children playing on it ran away with shrieks of laughter.

“HI HICCUP’S MOM!” the twins shouted in unison before racing down the hill, double headed dragon just a few paces behind. 

Astrid tilted her head towards the town square. “Valka’s our other dragon expert. About half the dragons on Berk respond to her training methods, the other half respond to Hiccup’s.” She swung onto Stormfly. “I’d love to stick around, but that pink Monstrous Nightmare should not be upside down right now. Snotlout, come help me.” She took off, with Snotlout and Hookfang following in grumbly pursuit.

Fishlegs, realizing slowly that he was the only viking left, sighed and trudged down after Hiccup and the twins, the outsiders following in stunned silence. 

Valka smiled warmly at them. “Welcome, visitors. I trust our welcoming party didn’t threaten to eat you?” The twinkle in her eye and barely restrained giggle gave a sense of playfulness to her concerning words. She gestured to the dragon beside her. “I’m Valka, and this is Cloudjumper.” The dragon tilted its head, almost a bow. “You’ve already met my son, the chief.”

Hiccup turned a bit red but didn’t correct her. “Berk has several spare houses, since fires are a common hazard of dragon training. You can stay in one of those, I can take you there when you’re ready.”

Newt inched closer to Cloudjumper. “What kind of dragon is this? I’ve never seen anything like it.” 

Valka smiled proudly. “He’s a Stormcutter, they’re remarkably rare. We met quite by accident, nearly two decades ago. Cloudjumper is the most loyal companion I could ask for.”

Newt seemed satisfied with her answer, and was poised to ask more questions when a loud yawn from Jacob interrupted him. “Oh, uh, sorry,” Jacob said, embarrassed. “It’s been a long, uh, how long has it been?” He turned to Queenie, who shrugged.

“I think we should really take you up on that offer of a place to sleep for now,” Tina supplied. “There’ll be plenty of time later to talk about dragons,” she added placatingly, looping an arm around Newt’s shoulders.

Newt, though obviously still anxious to find out more, followed Hiccup to their new home without complaint.


	3. Settling In

The friendly Viking folks definitely had a nice set up here, Jacob decided. After a restful 15 hours of sleep, he’d woken up to find the other four already missing from the family sized house the Vikings had let them stay in. Not knowing when they’d be back, Jacob concluded that he should start settling in. And what was better than coming home to the smell of fresh baked cookies?

To his delight, there was sugar and flour in the pantry, and a few large eggs in an icebox. Not exactly an icebox like you could get in New York, but a box with ice in it. The eggs seemed fresh, and Jacob had long since stopped questioning things that appeared to be magic. 

A bit more poking around revealed a spice cabinet. Jacob looked through it quickly and settled on a few in particular. On such a cold day, these cookies would be perfect.

It took him a bit to get the fireplace going, and not for the first time Jacob regretted not being born with magic of his own. He quickly brushed the thought aside and began mixing the dough ingredients together. Cookies don’t make themselves after all. 

A sheet of metal that he found would wedge nicely into the area above the fire served as a baking pan, and soon a dozen evenly spaced dollops of dough were on their way to becoming cookies. 

Jacob breathed in deeply, enjoying both the smell of the gingerbread and the warmth of the fire, and began prepping the next pan with cookies. He slipped easily into the rhythm of it, and within a few hours had piled several plates high with cookies. 

Satisfied that he had baked enough for his magical friends to enjoy when they returned, Jacob picked a few cookies for himself and sat on a chair in front of the fire to read through one of Newt’s notebooks. Knowing what sort of creatures they’d be handling while they traveled with the magizoologist was deemed top priority for the small group.

With his nose buried in a detailed explanation of the complex social interactions of a single Runespoor, Jacob didn’t hear the heavy wooden door creak open, or pay much attention to the cold draft that followed it. Consequently, it wasn’t until a very large something spit gingerbread crumbs on his stomach that Jacob was aware he wasn’t alone.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Jacob threw the notebook in the air and climbed onto the chair he was resting in.

The dragon let out a matching screech. It tried and failed to walk backwards and flipped over like a rolly polly. The notebook landed on Jacob’s head and stayed there while he stared at the creature in shock. It twisted around to look him over as well. The dragon was the same kind of dragon as Meatlug. Fishlegs had called it a gronkle. It was a dull shade of pink, and about the size of a donkey. Or, at least, a very well fed donkey.

The staring contest abruptly ended when Jacob noticed the crumbs around the gronkle’s mouth. “Oh no, oh no,” he said, mostly to himself as he went to go check on the plates of cookies. They were all knocked off the counter, cookies and crumbs alike stomped into the wooden floorboards.

Jacob turned to point at the dragon. “I’m gonna have to go get more ingredients now. You’re gonna stay where I can keep an eye on you.”

The gronkle looked as contrite as it could manage until Jacob turned away to grab his coat, at which point it perked back up and cheerfully followed along after him.

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

When Tina had set out to meet everyone on the island, she had expected it to go rather quickly. There couldn’t have been more than 200 people, and in New York she could have spoken to them all and been done by noon. What she hadn’t counted on was the fact that every single viking wanted to have a hour long conversation, and to show her their dragon, and to feed her. After turning down more fish than she knew the island had, she stumbled away from the village and up a small cliffside, having set her mind to spend a bit of time alone, and to continue meeting the new neighbors later.

Naturally, she was less than delighted to hear the old man screaming. Finding herself unable to not help, she sighed and ran towards the commotion until a small cottage came into view. A tall spindly man was tugging the end of a gardening hoe, the other end held firmly in the mouth of a small green dragon that she recognized as the same kind Astrid flew. A Deadly Nadder. 

“Go on, git!” The man shook the hoe and the dragon shook its entire body in response, its movements a fluid wave from head to tail. It growled and mimicked the man’s movement, shaking only its head, which slung him from side to side. 

Tina rushed up to them, stopping near the man with her hands on her knees. “How can I help?” she asked, a bit out of breath from the climb up.

“You can git this dragon away from my cabbage patch!” he wailed, tugging harder. Tina looked at the dragon’s feet, noting the numerous smashed vegetables.

Tina nodded and reached to take the hoe from the man. “Right away, sir.” He relinquished it a bit unwillingly. She briefly thought of using magic, but didn’t want to take the risk of the man reacting badly. If these people turned out to be like the Second Salemers they’d be run off the island for sure.

She pulled on the hoe, not having any better idea. The dragon nodded upwards and pulled her off her feet. Tina kicked her legs in the air, trying to find the ground, and it set her back down. Evidently now disinterested, the dragon dropped the hoe and wandered away of its own accord.

Tina handed the man back his now ruined and thoroughly slobbered-on hoe. “Is there anything I can-”

“You can git too! You’re one of those invader folks that washed up. Git away from my cottage!” The man jabbed the hoe at her, then apparently noticed for the first time how badly splintered it was. “Look what you did! Now I have to go make a new one!” The man threw the hoe on the ground in disgust and plodded into his cottage without another word.

Tina shook her head as he left. At least this conversation had been short. “Some people,” she sighed to the small green dragon that had circled around to sit behind her. It followed her from a distance as she made her way back into town. 

Inspiration struck her as she clumsily climbed back down the cliff. She looked up at the dragon watching her curiously from the top and nodded for it to follow. “Come on, Jack,” Tina called, testing out the name. The dragon vaulted down to her level and sat at attention. She nodded, pleased. “I’ll tell you the story of that name later. Help me down.” She held out a hand and rested it on the dragon’s head so she could use its innate stability to avoid falling. Jack nearly purred at the touch and tailed her at arm’s length afterwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update schedule, what update schedule? Sorry about that. I swear I do have a plot, it's just not gonna be relevant for a while. If you have any characters / dragons / types of dragons you want to see interacting, let me know! This will be about 99% fluff and I could use more ideas.


	4. Exploration

The town hall was impressive to say the least. It appeared to have been carved directly into the mountain. Queenie gazed around in awe of the place while Newt and Fishlegs compared notes on their respective dragon species. The hall’s decorations were lovingly crafted, and the architecture looked as though it could withstand heavy assault. From what she gathered from Fishleg’s scattered thoughts about the book they were going to read, it already had, many times. 

“So, um, Hiccup’s notes are more recent, but Hiccup’s busy working on the dam, so...” Fishlegs gestured to the large sheepskin bound book. “This is the Book of Dragons. It contains everything we knew about dragons prior to Toothless.”

“May I?” Newt asked, pointing to the book.

Fishlegs shrugged. “Sure.” He continued to talk while Newt flicked through the book, which was written in a language Queenie hadn’t seen before and was nearly certain Newt couldn’t read. “Most of the information is still accurate, even if our attitudes towards how to use it have changed. There are seven basic classes of dragons, and we now know about alphas, so that’s eight I guess? Er, not really, but that’s for later. 

“Anyways, first there’s the Stoker class, which is your fire breathers. Monsterous Nightmares like Hookfang and Fanghook are part of this group.”

“Stoker,” Newt mumbled under his breath. Queenie didn’t need her legilimacy to know that he was mentally classifying the dragons he was familiar with. From what she knew most of them would fit nicely in this class.

“And the tracker class, they’re really good at finding stuff, Deadly Nadders are trackers. That’s Astrid’s dragon, Stormfly. And Meatlug is a Gronkle, part of the boulder class, which is pretty self explanatory I think. 

“Toothless is really the only Strike class dragon that’s been tamed. They’re very fast and very hostile and don’t typically stick around long enough to befriend. That Snaptrapper you met and Barf and Belch are Mystery class dragons, that’s just kinda where we classified the ones that didn’t fit the other categories. Changewings go here too, they have really good camouflage, hence the name.

“Uh, you haven’t met any Tidal class dragons I think. They’re aquatic. Help a lot with fishing, when they feel like it, and the Sharp class helps a lot with lumber and construction stuff. So, that’s it I think.” Fishlegs looked over Newt’s shoulder to see what page he was on.

Queenie sat on the table a bit away from them. “Were you going to tell us about the alphas too?” she asked sweetly. She might be able to get information about the dragons the easy way, but her magizoologist would need it spoken aloud. 

Fishlegs nodded rapidly. “Right, right. Alphas can be any species, we think, it’s more of a social designation. All the dragons in an area take orders from this one particular dragon, usually they’re one of the really big species. We know of four alphas, but three of those are dead, so I guess we really only know about-”

“Toothless,” Newt finished.

Queenie noted Fishleg’s surprise at Newt’s correct guess and felt a swell of pride. “Uh, yep. Yeah, Toothless is the alpha for every dragon we know of in the archipelago. Except the Deathsong, and the Screaming Death, but, uh, well, they could be alphas if they didn’t eat every other dragon they got near. Anyways...”

Fishlegs pulled the book towards him and read off the descriptions for specific dragons, starting from the beginning. Newt listened intently while Queenie kept her focused gaze on the equally focused Fishlegs, slowly piecing together the fundamentals of the odd written language from his mind.

They were on the entry for Boneknapper dragons when the doors of the hall opened with a crash.

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

“...and I’m sure you know what a forge is for, so we can skip talking to Gobber and go check out the armory!”

Credence wouldn’t have minded talking to Gobber, but Snotlout seemed very anxious to show him something else so he followed quietly behind him. Part of him wanted to ask the boy showing him around Berk to be a bit quieter, and another part wanted to join in and talk as loudly as he could. But he had nothing to say, so he said nothing.

The armory was full of enough weapons to reasonably well equip a small army. Credence kept his distance while Snotlout demonstrated each of them on a practice dummy. After several minutes of Credence flinching whenever the dummy was struck, Snotlout noticed his lack of enthusiasm. 

“Aaaayyy, what’s the matter? Aren’t I being awesome enough for you?” Snotlout casually poked Credence shoulder with the club he was currently holding, which caused the other boy to drop to the ground, visibly shaking. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry for whatever I did.” Snotlout dropped the club and knelt by Credence. He reached out to awkwardly pat him on the back, but Credence physically recoiled away from his touch. “Um, okay, maybe we’ve had enough of the armory for one day. Let’s take the rest of today to just relax.”

Snotlout stood and held out a hand to help Credence up. He didn’t move immediately, nor did he accept the offered help when he did stand. He shuffled away from Snotlout, head bowed. 

“Okaaaay. Well, I know this great place to watch the sun set. No people, or dragons, or noises, or things that might freak you out again. Well, usually no dragons. The terrible terrors are everywhere. What about it?” 

Credence didn’t answer, but he gave the smallest of nods. Snotlout reached to wrap an arm around his shoulders, but Credence moved away so fast Snotlout didn’t see him actually move. He withdrew his arm and instead pointed in the direction of a particular tree across the village. “It’s that one. Great view. Do you climb?”

Again, Credence didn’t answer, but slightly shook his head. “Okay. I’ll show you. No one climbs trees like Jorgensons!” Snotlout started towards the tree, babbling loudly the whole way. He didn’t seem to have any malicious intentions, he was just... too much. In every way, he was loud, and aggressive, and arrogant. His ma would have hated this boy. 

Some dark, spiteful part of Credence latched onto that fact and clung to it. He hated that he could feel the evil within him influencing his thoughts and actions. Newt and Tina had told him about the parasite, about how he could work with and around it instead of letting it control him. Still, he tried to match Snotlout’s confident strides, suddenly determined to make this work out. If he could make this loud, aggressive, arrogant boy his friend, it would be a slap in the face to everything his ma had preached. He needed this like he needed the air in his lungs.

Climbing the tree was hard, as he’d never done it before, but Snotlout was happy to provide tips and pointers. Thankfully, he didn’t try to help Credence again. Despite his newfound determination to befriend Snotlout, Credence wasn’t sure he could keep from smoking out if Snotlout grabbed his hand and touched the scars. That was not something he could handle at the moment.

When Snotlout deemed they were high enough in the tree, Credence tried to figure out the best way to stay stationary in it. Remaining as he was had his arms supporting a lot of his weight, and he felt certain he would fall if he didn’t keep moving. He looked over at Snotlout to see what he was doing. 

Snotlout had swung one leg over a branch to sit, as though he were riding a dragon. Credence stiffly copied him, a hand still clutching a higher branch for a feeling of security. It took him a while before he was no longer terrified of falling, though he deliberately avoided looking at the ground. 

“Ah, best spot in all of Berk,” Snotlout sighed. “Just wait about an hour, the sunset gets reflected off the ocean. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen.”

Credence looked over at him in shock. “You can just, take an hour, and do nothing? Isn’t there work to do?” 

Snotlout looked back at him in equal shock and Credence realized that the other boy hadn’t heard him speak before. He recovered quickly, and waved his hands about as he floundered for an answer. “Well, the dragons take care of a lot of it. Around Berk, it’s okay to do less.” 

Credence nodded slowly, processing this information. Berk seemed in every way to be the utopia he’d hoped the magical world would be. Now he just had to not screw it up.

Unable to decide what to say or do, Credence said and did nothing. The sun sank until it was almost resting on the horizon. It was peaceful. It had been a long, long while since Credence had felt peaceful. 

Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to last. A bright purple streak fell from the sky, almost like a shooting star. It landed on a tiny outcrop of rock far at sea. Sparks flew from the thing, visible even at such a distance. Snotlout sat straight up and squinted at it. 

“That’s- that’s bad. We should tell Hiccup.” He began climbing down the tree, movements swift and practiced. Credence followed clumsily, but got to the ground alright. Snotlout was already halfway to the town hall, and Credence chased after him. Whatever the crash was, it had to be important. Snotlout wouldn’t leave him behind if it wasn’t. At least, Credence hoped not. He thought it had been going well, but maybe not. Maybe he’d never really matter to anyone after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't forget about this, I swear, I'm just really slow.


	5. The Skrill

Snotlout’s yells of alarm were mostly incoherent at first, though the vague sense of needing to find Hiccup came across alright. Queenie set about calming the frantic boy.

“Alright, alright, so let’s see, you and Credence were watching the sunset when a dragon- Skrill- fell out of the sky? And it’s either hurt or dangerous or both? And we need to get Hiccup to deal with it?” 

Snotlout nodded in reply, still in the midst of catching his breath. Fishlegs seemed slightly amazed that she had gotten that from a set of hand motions and ‘boom crack’ sounds. “I think he said he was checking up on the orchard on the other side of the island. I’ll go get him.” 

As he left, Meatlug trailing behind, Credence and Tina entered with a smallish green dragon. They headed over to the other three, footsteps strangely loud in the sudden quiet. Snotlout’s breathing had evened out by the time they crossed the length of the hall and he began explaining the emergency again.

“The dragon just dropped out of nowhere, like it saw a spot to land and took the first thing it could get, I’ve only ever seen wounded dragons do that. It had its own storm cloud basically, which means its probably a Skrill.” Noticing the open Book of Dragons left on the table, Snotlout flipped to the appropriate page and held it out for the newcomers to see. “Strike class. Incredibly hostile, incredibly powerful, and this one’s probably been hurt by trappers, which won’t help us any.”

“Trappers?” Tina tilted her head to accentuate her question. The dragon at her side copied the motion.

Snotlout nodded, uncharacteristically serious. “They snatch dragons right out of the air to make them work for them or to sell them. All the riders have been caught by trappers at some point while flying, and a good chunk of our time is spent fending them off. Berk is a dragon hotspot, they’d all love to take it if they could. Having a Skrill that’s probably escaped from them crash off our shore is not good. Skrill are easy to track and very valuable. The trappers won’t be far behind.”

Queenie pulled Credence into a side hug and ran her hand up and down his arm in an attempt to bring his thoughts back to Earth. The Skrill was hated and hunted for no crime other than being what it was. Their similarities were a bit concerning. 

“Well, this sounds like something for the seasoned professionals to take care of, why don’t we leave you to it?” Queenie smiled as she began backing away. Credence hastily followed her lead and they left the hall.

Silence fell again before Newt awkwardly cleared his throat and pointed to the dragon. “Who’s this?”

Tina perked up, happy to have something to discuss while they waited. “Jack!” The dragon shook itself head to tail upon hearing its name. “We ran into each other, and it followed me, and I think it likes the name?”

Newt held out a hand palm down to the dragon and kept his eyes on the ground near its feet. Jack stuck its head under his hand and made more of its purring noises as he scratched its head. “Friendly fellow.”

Tina sunk down onto the bench beside him and watched their interaction. “Not when we first met,” she laughed. “This old guy who lived apart from the village was fighting with it. It destroyed some of his stuff, and then he yelled at both of us, and then Jack and I left.” She glanced at Snotlout hurriedly. “Of course, I can definitely help repair-”

He waved a hand to cut her off. “Nah, that’s just Mildew. He hates dragons, and everyone else, and dragons hate him. We all let him handle his own business.” He circled the dragon, inspecting it. “Looks like you got a Deadly Nadder, male, on the small side but as grown as its gonna get. Not any of the villager’s dragons, so must be one of the wild ones that hang around. You gonna keep him?” He looked up at Tina.

She stared back, a bit surprised. “I mean- can I?” Snoutlout nodded his assent and Tina reached over to join Newt in giving the Deadly Nadder attention. “I think Jack and I would both like that.”

A lightbulb seemed to switch on for Newt. “You wouldn’t happen to have named him after the famous London serial killer, would you have, Tina?”

Tina shrugged. “I don’t know, what do you think, Ripper?” The dragon sprung to life, spikes extending outwards from their previously relaxed positions, a fierce gleam suddenly appearing in its eyes. Newt withdrew his hand and watched the dragon carefully. “I think that’s a yes,” Tina managed between gasps of laughter. “A scary name for a scary dragon, huh?” Jack relaxed his spines and laid his head against her arm happily. 

Tina pet Jack like she would a cat while Newt absently flicked through the Book of Dragons. Snotlout was in the middle of expressing his frustration at Hiccup and Fishleg’s tardiness when the Hall’s doors swung open again.

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

“Don’t let it worry you dear, I’m sure Hiccup will know what to do. It sounds like this is at least something familiar around here.” Queenie was having a bit of trouble keeping her pace slow enough to match Credence’s. The outsiders’ new home was on the edge of the village, quite a walk from the Hall. 

Credence didn’t answer, but Queenie felt that not all of the hurt had to do with the Skrill. “Friendships don’t happen overnight, Credence. People are difficult, they take a bit of time.”

“Not for you.” The words weren’t bitter, instead they carried a strange sense of disconnect. Queenie could feel the emotions that ran even deeper, sadness and longing and cynicism, all bubbling to the surface despite the boy’s best efforts to push them away.

She sighed and put her arm back around his shoulder, pulling them together. “Legilimency does make understanding people easier,” she admitted. She considered telling him about its drawbacks, about how she knew infinitely more about everyone than they would ever know about her, how only a muggle had ever really tried to know her beyond her ability. How she couldn’t so much as walk down the street without accidentally hearing something to make her want to grip her wand tight like a security blanket. How she couldn’t keep from finding _things_ about people she’d wanted to trust, how none of the cases that kept Tina up for nights thinking through the convoluted psychological motivations fazed her in the least. She’d heard it all. She couldn’t not. Most days she’d trade her legilimency for simple silence in a heartbeat.

Instead, she squeezed his shoulders and offered a dazzling smile that she hoped reached her eyes. “Most wizards and witches can learn it, to some degree. I can try to teach you if you’d like?”

The surprise hit her first, so strongly that she almost gasped. Then the others, like a whirlwind, joy and distrust and confusion and hopefulness and terror. Only years of practice kept her smile in place as he tried to process this. Finally, the confusion and distrust and terror ebbed away, still present but less so, and Credence answered her. “I think I’d like that.”

“Wonderful!” Queenie’s smile shifted, less controlled now. “Lessons are whenever we both have nothing to do, we can start tomorrow if you’d like- do you smell gingerbread?” She stopped short, a few meters from the borrowed house. “Must be Jacob. How sweet of him!” 

She pushed open the door and was immediately greeted by a large pink blob making some sound between a seal’s bark and that of a dog. “Oh! Hello there,” Queenie sidestepped it and gestured for Credence to do the same. “Jacob! Could you introduce us to your new friend?”

Jacob poked his head out of the kitchen, half covered in flour and egg. “Ging! Leave ‘em be.” 

The dragon turned upon hearing its name, nearly knocking both Credence and Queenie over with its heavy tail, and padded back to the kitchen, where it promptly lay down at Jacob’s feet and rolled over, mouth opened expectantly. 

“Now, you’ve had enough, don’t you think?” He waved to them and held out a plate stacked with cookies. “Want some? Gingerbread ate most of them, but I made a lot.”

Queenie took a cookie and knelt down to rub Gingerbread’s exposed belly. “Oh, did he? What a sweet dragon.” Gingerbread tried to sit up to eat the cookie she held but didn’t quite manage to lift itself that much. Queenie laughed and stood up, surveying the state of the kitchen. She drew her wand and flicked it at the disorder. Pots and baking sheets cleaned themselves and flour and spices removed themselves from the floor. The mess was gone before she’d finished her first bit. 

“They’re absolutely wonderful, Jacob, thank you.” Queenie kissed his cheek and smiled at him. “I think I’ll go check on Newt’s case, he said that Dougal should be keeping everyone in line, but they have been on their own all day.” She made for the bedroom Newt had left the case in, locked with both magic and muggle locks. Gingerbread rolled back over and trotted after her.

“You’re wonderful,” Jacob sighed as she left. He seemed to return to his senses after a moment and nodded to Credence. “You can have some too if you’d like. I made them for everyone.”

Credence froze, caught between the two punishable actions of being rude by not accepting and imposing by doing so. In the end he murmured a quiet thanks and took a cookie. 

He silently sat at the table and to eat it. Jacob sat across from him and rubbed his growling stomach. “I’ve got some fish over the fire now for dinner. How cooked do you like yours?”

Credence tilted his head in confusion. Jacob nodded awkwardly. “Ah, right. Medium well, then. That’s how I like mine anyways, I think it’s just the right amount of done but not overdone. You can tell me if you disagree, yeah?”

Credence nodded, still slowly nibbling the cookie. They sat in silence for a minute before Jacob got up to check on the fish. When he returned, Credence had vanished. It took a while, but Jacob eventually found him curled up behind a couch. 

“Might be more comfortable to sit up here, on the couch.” Jacob demonstrated. When he realized Credence wasn’t going to move he continued. “The fish should be done son. Er- I meant soon.” He dabbed at some sweat on his forehead with his handkerchief and replaced it in his pocket. “You know, all this magic and creatures and all is starting to feel kinda normal. Like, I think I’d miss life without it. I could never go back to the canning factory after all this.” He laughed a little. “Just watch though, somebody’ll say that people can turn into animals now and I’ll be back at square one not knowing anything.”

“Animagi.” 

The word was quiet from behind the couch and Jacob wasn’t sure he’d heard it right. “I’m sorry?”

“People that can turn into animals are called animagi. Tina told me.”

Jacob fought the urge to turn back and look at Credence and instead kept his eyes fixed forward. “Oh. Huh.” He spent a few moments thinking over this. “I think I’m more surprised by how little that surprises me than... I lost where I was going with this.” He dared a glance back and noted the telltale wisps of shadow hovering around Credence. “I may not be a legilimence like Queenie, but I know something’s up. Do you wanna talk about it?”

“No.”

Jacob nodded even though Credence couldn’t see him. “Okay. I’m gonna go check the fish again.” He got up and shuffled back off to the kitchen. Finding the fish done, he them on plates and left one by the case. Gingerbread was gone and Jacob assumed he was in the case with Queenie. He knocked on the case and then went back to get fish for Credence and himself. 

Credence was sitting on the couch when he returned. He handed over the fish and received another quiet thank you. Jacob sat beside him and ate his own fish. It tasted much better than the fish that came from New York’s harbour, and Jacob decided that he could get used to this life.

“A dragon fell out of the sky today.”

Jacob didn’t respond to this, worried that Credence wouldn’t say anything else if he did. He nodded in what he hoped was an encouraging way, trying to understand what this had to do with anything.

“Snotlout says it’s hurt. And that it’s been trapped and is being hunted. And we can’t help it because it’s dangerous and lashes out at people.”

Realization dawned heavily on Jacob. “Oh.”

“And that it’ll bring dangerous people to Berk.”

Jacob reached over to pat Credence on the knee. “Don’t worry. Hiccup will take care of it. He seems like he knows what he’s doing. And if he can’t, Newt will. The man could never abandon any creature that needs help.” Almost as an afterthought, as though he hadn’t known why the dragon had made Credence so upset, he added, “MACUSA can’t find us here. We’ve run far enough now.” Jacob picked up the now empty plates and took them back to the kitchen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me? Procrastinating actual work? Whaaat? If you want to see particular people or dragons interacting, let me know. My fluff to plot ratio goal is 90/10, could use more fluff ideas.


	6. Fireworms

Toothless paced the width of the Hall, his tail sweeping rhythmically back and forth, perfectly in time with Hiccup’s breathing, Newt noticed with fascination. Hiccup ignored the throne at the head of the Hall, choosing instead to stand close to the growing gathering of people and dragons that were trickling in from outside.

“The dragon is definitely a Skrill. It does look injured, but that will mean it’s more aggressive if anything. We’re going to leave it alone for now, and it will most likely leave before sunrise. No one is to engage it in any way. Understand?”

His voice was powerful and commanding, more like when he’d met them on the beach than any other time Newt had heard him. He waited for mumbles of assent from his audience before continuing. “It was probably wounded by another Strike class dragon or trappers. In either case, we should be expecting trouble. Make sure to keep your dragons inside until we know what we’re dealing with.” 

As Hiccup concluded, he seemed to realize how late it had gotten. His face softened slightly and he waved a hand to dismiss the crowd. “Go home and rest, we’ll see what needs to be done tomorrow.”

The villagers filed out, until only Hiccup and Astrid were left with their dragons. “What a day, huh?” Astrid asked, leaning against one of the Hall’s pillars. 

Hiccup collapsed onto as bench with a sigh. “Tell me about it. First the strangers show up and now this? And do you know how many times I’ve fished Gustav out of the river today? He keeps saying he’s looking for a Flightmare.” Hiccup pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers and shook his head wearily.

“One thing at a time, O great chief. For now, you should take your own advice and rest. It’ll all still be here in the morning.” 

“Thanks, Astrid.”

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

Newt sat on the dirt, stroking a pair of Occamies and surveying the newest occupants of his home. 

Gingerbread had made himself comfortable in Susan’s enclosure, though Susan was still a bit unsure about the oddly colored animal. She prodded him gently with her horn to see his reaction, which was to promptly use it to pull himself on top of her. She seemed bemused but not altogether unhappy about this development. 

Credence was playing hide and seek with Dougal and a few of the diricrawl chicks. As soon as he found any of them, they’d vanish from sight. The diricrawl would appear a few feet away from their original location, but Dougal could only be tracked by objects moving when they shouldn’t have been. As Credence spun around, trying to track the ever apparating chicks, the electric light from the main cabin reflected off the triangular symbol he wore and Newt looked away, suddenly feeling a bit ill.

Atop the aquatic section sat Queenie and Jacob, laughing softly to each other as the ramora and plimpy swam below. The glowing creatures hovered above their heads, casting both in a soft light.

Noises of frustration from Tina caught Newt’s attention. She was attempting to train Jack to bring her things, but he seemed more interested in tapping on the metal cups she tossed than returning them to her. She gave up after a few tries and switched to a sort of memory game where she tapped the cups and waited for Jack to tap them in order. The dragon seemed to like this game much better, and after a few rounds tapped the cups first and waited for Tina. 

Newt couldn’t help but smile. This... this wasn’t that bad. The word ‘family’ sprung to Newt’s mind unbidden and he quickly lowered his gaze to the Occamies entwined around his arms. Pickett pulled at his shirt collar and patted him on the chin worriedly. 

“Yes, I’m quite alright,” he answered the bowtruckle, willing away the red in his cheeks. “Everything is just as it should be.”

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

Morning broke much louder than it had the day before. The entire house shuddered under the impact, instantly rousing its five human occupants. “Good morning!” Valka trilled, evidently on top of the house.

Newt nearly knocked Tina over as he raced to the front door. “Morning,” she mumbled after him as she redirected herself to the kitchen in hopes of finding coffee. 

Bursting outside, Newt turned back and waved up at the roof. “Hello Valka!” he called. 

Cloudjumper leapt to the ground with a dull thud. “Are you ready?” Valka and Cloudjumper’s eyes shared a glimmer of excited mischief.

“Am I ever!” The magizoologist had a blank notebook with him, and two pens tucked in his front pocket alongside Pickett. He bowed to Cloudjumper who lowered his head in return. Only after Cloudjumper’s approval did he accept Valka’s outstretched hand and climb on behind her.

“So polite,” she laughed.

“Well, you sort of make a habit of it around hippogriffs.”

Cloudjumper took before Newt was fully ready. He wrapped his arms tightly around Valka’s waist and tried not to scream as the ground fell away. 

Three sets of powerful wings rapidly brought them up to an altitude Valka deemed acceptable. Cloudjumper set into a hard turn so that they were nearly sideways and all of Berk was visible below.

Aside from the ice tips of the mountain peaks and the area around the village, the island was completely forested. Everything about it was steep. Abundant cliffs turned the three small rivers from the melting mountain ice into a series of waterfalls and kept the island itself from much contact with the ocean. Even the bays were rimmed with cliffs.

The most prominent features of Berk were clearly not natural. From the air, Newt could clearly see how much the vikings had built. The training arena alone was comparable in size to the ones the wizards used in the war, and even that was dwarfed by the stadium. Docking areas built into the cliffsides seemed like they might lead to underground structures. Dragons flew in and out of these areas, some with riders and some without. Berk was positively buzzing with human and dragon activity.

Cloudjumper straightened up again and Valka pointed to another island in the distance, surrounded by fog like Berk was. “Our first stop is a Fireworm nest,” she shouted over the roar of the wind in their ears. “If you’re as polite to the queen as you are to Cloudjumper, she’ll let you look around.”

Newt nodded his understanding and risked a glance down. Stormcutters were much faster than Ukrainian Ironbellies, and it showed in the way the choppy northern ocean blurred into a featureless expanse of blue. Newt lifted his eyes to try to shake off the feeling of vertigo, and studied the island they were approaching instead. It looked volcanic, as he suspected most of the archipelago was, though more recently formed than Berk. It was small, composed of porous dark rock, and didn’t extend very high out of the sea. He couldn’t see any particular features for a nest to be located.

As they got closer, he could make out holes dotting the surface of the island, and bright glowing specks that broke up the monotony of the dark island. It dawned on him that the entire island itself must be the Fireworm nest, likely with an underground system of caves. Soon, he could make out that the dark ‘rock’ the island was made of was in fact burnt vegetation. 

Cloudjumper circled the island and landed slowly, giving the surprisingly small dragons time to move out of the way. Valka and Newt slid off and Cloudjumper leapt back into the air. 

Valka laughed. “He hates Fireworms. Most dragons do, they burn like the dickens. Not the Stoker class though, they love the little beasties.” She knelt down beside a glowing speck and motioned for Newt to come look at it too.

It was nearly a carbon copy of a gecko, if geckos had wings and glowed like embers. Heat radiated from it, not enough to cut through the chill of the ocean air, but enough to make it apparent that touching it would hurt. Two inches head to tail, the tiny dragon crawled about haphazardly across the scorched ground. It flew away on a delicate set of double butterfly wings when it realized it was being watched. Newt looked up to take in the full island, dotted with the tiny creatures.

“There must be hundreds. How do you tell which is the queen?” 

Valka snorted and put a hand over her mouth, evidently trying to cover a string of giggles. She shook her head and took in a large breath. Still stifling a little laughter, she explained. “The queen lives underground, with the rest of the nest. Follow me, I think you’ll be able to tell her apart.”

Newt nodded and followed her towards one of the bigger holes in the island, which turned out to be a tunnel entrance. Valka jumped into it, though it was so shallow her head still poked over surface level. 

“Won’t we need light?” Newt asked, climbing down more carefully after her. 

“No, I don’t think we will. Mind your head,” she called over her shoulder as she ducked into the small tunnel.

Newt followed, doing his best to keep Valka within arm’s reach. As they moved away from the entrance, a dull orange glow from deeper in the tunnel replaced it. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to see by, and the stream of Fireworms accompanying them helped add their own light.

Newt curiously watched the little dragons coming and going the same way they were, and occasionally dodged the flying ones, though there were few of them.

Valka stopped short and held a hand behind her to indicate Newt should pause too. They had reached an area where the tunnel opened up, and though he couldn’t see much around Valka, the intensity of the light and heat told Newt they had reached their destination. 

A scuffling sound echoed off the cavern walls as something big approached the pair. Valka stepped out of the tunnel and curtsied. Newt peeked around her to get a good look at the Fireworm Queen. 

She was similar in shape to the smaller Fireworms, though she was about the size of graphorn. Unlike the smaller Fireworms, her skin appeared thick and armored, and a particularly thick section of armor around her head gave her the appearance of wearing a crown. She fixed her ember-like eyes on Newt and he rushed to move beside Valka and bow.

The Queen gave a soft snort of approval and turned away to lay down in one corner of the incredibly bright cavern. Now that he was fully inside, Newt gaped in awe of the Fireworms’ work. 

Several walls and the ceiling were coated in what looked to Newt like honeycomb, dripping a glowing golden substance in some places. He cautiously approached and peeked inside one of the tiny hexagons. Beyond the thin film he could just make out a little moving shape. 

“Firecomb will burn just as surely as the Fireworms will,” Valka warned. Newt stepped back a bit, still studying the structure intently. 

He pointed to the golden mess dripping out of the firecomb. “What’s this?”

“Burning honey. They make an overabundance of it, so over time it forms the stalagmites and stalactites in this cavern.”

Once his attention was brought to them, Newt noticed the solid amber-like formations scattered about the cave. He held his hand over the surface of one; despite obviously being old, it gave off as much heat as the firecomb did. 

“Incredible,” he whispered. Pickett whined from deep inside his pocket, unused to such temperatures. Newt wiped sweat off his forehead and took one more look around. “This has been incredible Valka, really, but do you think we could come back some time later?”

She laughed, a sound that reverberated off the cavern walls beautifully. “Just let me know when you’re ready to take on the heat again.”

Back on the surface, Newt looked over the charred island, all previous life a casualty of the nest below. “Valka,” he asked, looking in the sky for Cloudjumper. “What do the villagers think of Fireworms?”

“They’re pests. They destroy everything in their path and the hive as a whole isn’t smart enough to be reasoned with. Most will follow their queen but not all. Even one can cause devastation.” 

“Oh.” Then, aften a moment, “Valka, why did you bring me here first?”

“You needed to understand, we’re the outsiders. Dragons have been around long before humans touched this archipelago. Even the most invasive of species has their roots here.” 

Cloudjumper descended from apparently nowhere. The downdraft that accompanied him blew the tiny Fireworms away from his landing site.

“And,” she added with a slight smile towards Newt, “I wondered if you’d appreciate them as much as I do. It’s getting rather hard to find people who love dragons simply for being dragons.” She clapped excitedly. “Come on now, I bet we can make it in time to see that Terrible Terror hatch if we hurry back!”


	7. Chapter 7

“Tina, calm down!” Astrid ducked under Jack’s tail as it swept over her head. Stormfly growled low behind her, but Astrid held out a hand to keep her still.

 

“I’m not the one freaking out, he’s freaking out!” Tina yelled. She ducked back behind the small wooden shield as Jack’s spikes embedded themselves in it. 

 

“He’s just responding to you. When you panic, Jack thinks there’s danger. You can’t be scared of training him!” Astrid rolled behind a training dummy and gestured for Tina to move towards Jack.

 

She obliged, hesitantly lowering the shield and trying to mimic the voice Newt used on his own panicking creatures. “Hey, hey, it’s alright buddy, I’m sorry, there’s nothing to be scared of right now, please stop?” 

 

Jack froze where he was, wings and spikes all extended in an attack pose. As Tina inched closer, he withdrew to a more relaxed position, moving jerkily and only a bit at a time, which reminded Tina of the creepy animatronics she saw sometimes in shop windows. “That’s it. Much better.” She stretched out a hand to the dragon.

 

Jack bolted and attached himself to the bars that covered the training area, hanging upside down like a bat. Astrid laughed as she stood up and surveyed the damage Jack had done to the arena. “Ripper’s a good name for him. He’s still pretty much wild, Tina. Give it time.”

 

“I know... I just... You guys make it look so easy.” She eyed Stormfly, who was now following just behind Astrid, a little enviously.

 

Astrid patted Stormfly proudly. “And we’ve been together for ages. Maybe, you could start off with games instead of combat training. The rest will follow once you’re both comfortable with each other.” She headed for the exit, and called back to Tina, “I think you two need some time alone. We’ll be in earshot if you need help!”

 

Tina watched them leave and looked dejectedly back up at Jack. “Okay. Thanks,” she muttered. 

 

She spied an object that was probably part of a weapon at some point. It was a rope with two heavy looking balls attached to the ends. “Hey!” she yelled up to Jack. “Wanna try fetch again?” She held up the thing and shook it. Jack shook his entire body and pulled into a crouch, still hanging from the ceiling. Tina tossed the thing and Jack was after it in a flash. 

 

His entire body curled around the thing when he caught it, but after a bit of mid-air twisting he landed on his feet with it in his mouth. He looked to Tina, pride evident in his pulled back shoulders and slightly extended wings. 

 

“Good boy!” Tina called, walking over to him. “You were so fast!” She noted the way Jack bounced when she said that. “I bet you like to go fast?” 

 

Jack dropped the thing she’d tossed and ran to a door which he butted with his nose until Tina caught up to him. “What’s in here?” She pulled the door open. “Oh. Well, if you insist.”

 

Both Tina and Jack grinned like children as Tina fitted a set of riding equipment around him. Jack held perfectly still for her, though when she released him to get the next thing she needed he hopped in place, head bobbing excitedly. It took her a good while to get everything adjusted properly, but eventually she had worked it all out and was seated on top of Jack, reins in hand.

 

“Okay, I think we should start off kind of slow, maybe to the Hall and baaaAACCCCKKKK!” Jack had taken off running for the arena exit and had scarcely cleared it before he stretched his wings to the side and lifted off. Tina clung to the reins and hunched over as far as she could, though the wind still bit at her face regardless. 

 

Jack sent the horizon spinning as he pulled into a tight somersault, and Tina thanked her lucky stars that she’d found the leg braces that kept her attached to him. She only noticed the blue blur to her left when Jack did, and took off after it. The pair quickly gained on Astrid and Stormfly, who were turning in an attempt to get Jack to turn with them.

 

Jack sped past them when they slowed to take the curve, and they hurried to keep up. With Stormfly quite literally nipping at his heels, Jack sped even faster. They’d long since left the island and Jack headed for pillars of rock jutting out of the ocean. It was all Tina could do to hang on as he zipped around and between them. Stormfly and Astrid flew over the rocks, and they used the slight time advantage to apprehend the smaller dragon when he emerged on the other side. Stormfly practically slammed Jack into a rock and held him there until he stopped wriggling under her claws.

 

“Uh, thanks,” Tina said, somewhat disoriented and still clinging to Jack for dear life. 

 

Astrid took the reins and made a few adjustments so she could pull Jack behind her as Stormfly flew. “I think you have a racer here. Maybe just practice steering a bit more when we get back to Berk, huh?” She laughed. “You aren’t really a dragon rider at all until your dragon decides to scare the daylights out of you.”

 

“It’s just this once though, right?” Tina almost pleaded.

 

Astrid shared an amused glance with Stormfly, then they took off, dragging Jack and Tina along. “Sure,” she called over her shoulder. “Yeah, definitely.”

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

“Oh, oh honey, it’s swish and flick, not swirl and jab. See?” Queenie demonstrated the motion again. 

 

Credence traced what she’d done slowly with his wand. It was of elder wood, 15 inches long, with a Thestral tail hair for a core, and stolen.

 

Their escape from New York had been narrow to say the least. After Tina used some kind of stunning spell on Mr. Graves in the subway system and Credence took his wand away, they’d all hidden in Newt’s case to avoid the fast-approaching aurors. Jacob had gotten on a no-maj train to Philadelphia, where Tina knew of a man who was part of an unregistered Floo network who could get them to London. There, they’d stolen the first leakproof craft they’d come across and set sail.

 

This hadn’t given them much time to teach Credence the ins and outs of magic. Fortunately, he seemed naturally inclined to use it on his own, now that it wasn’t necessary to conceal it. Several times now things had simply happened because he wanted them to. Tina called this child’s magic and told him he’d grown out of it when he learned wandwork and spells, though Credence didn’t particularly want to outgrow it. Sure, it wasn’t very controlled, but it was powerful. He could tell from how Newt reacted. Jacob didn’t know better, and Tina and Queenie had worked for a long time with powerful people like the president and Mr. Graves, but Newt was always a bit surprised. 

 

The first lesson he’d had in wand magic was with Newt. He leaned towards practical magic, never using a proper spell when a homemade one did the job better. The lesson had lasted all of a minute, long enough for Newt to impart the word  _ lumos _ and, when the resulting light from the end of Credence’s stolen wand shone brighter than the sun in July, the counter spell,  _ nox _ . He’d said it was a wonder the wand didn’t shatter from the sheer force of it. It wasn’t meant to be a powerful spell. Perhaps bright enough to read by. 

 

Newt never asked him to do any wandwork after that. Potions and other instinctive types of magic were what Newt prefered anyways. Potions turned out to be very much like cooking soup, just with unusual ingredients. They’d made Draught of Peace several times, as it helped some of the more excitable creatures, and Tina on occasion, to get to rest. Credence had tried a bit himself, and found that though he got the best sleep he’d had in years, he didn’t like how much it dulled his senses.

 

Tina’s lessons centered more on defensive magic. It made sense, he supposed. All the wizards in America, and probably several other countries when they learned he existed, were looking for them. Being able to disarm someone at a distance was a useful skill. Still, despite Tina’s protests that she was fine and he was doing great, he wasn’t very keen to use the spells she taught after accidentally sending her crashing through several of Newt’s makeshift enclosures with  _ expelliarmus _ . 

 

And now Queenie had her own brand of magic to offer. She suggested they start off with simpler magic so that jumping straight into legilimency wouldn’t be so difficult. “Oh, yes, that’s much better! Now, try it again!”

 

Credence repeated the motion faster. “ _ Wingardium leviosa. _ ” The metal cup they were practicing on shot upwards and left a dent in the thatching of the house.

 

Queenie looked up at the dent and sighed. “My fault, I should have gotten you something heavier to work with. Anyways, that was a nice warm up, time to get started.” She clapped her hands excitedly. “So, this works best with really good eye contact. Then, you point your wand and say  _ legilimens _ , no movements or anything needed.” She looked Credence in the eyes, waiting.

 

He looked down and took a few steps back, twisting his wand uncertainty between his fingers. 

 

Queenie stepped forward to take his hand. “Oh, hey, hey, what’s wrong? Tell me.”

 

He pulled away from her touch, almost collapsing in on himself. When he did speak, the words were quiet. “I don’t want to hurt you. What if I do it wrong?”

 

Queenie sat on the couch and patted the seat beside her. “Guess I should have started with the theory part of the lesson, huh? Better late than never.” She crossed on ankle over the other and waited for Credence to sit before she began. “You’re scared because this is advanced magic and you associate that with danger. Legilimency is an uncommon and restricted skill, not because it causes damage, but because it’s hard and because most people don’t want their mind invaded. Most wizards who try it don’t get any results at all, so they don’t do it again. Sometimes people use it badly, but that’s their intention to start with. If the person using legilimency isn’t using it maliciously, the magic itself isn’t malicious. Do you see?”

 

Credence nodded slowly. “So it doesn’t hurt?”

 

“Not at all! No one at MACUSA except Tina knew I could do it, and I used it every day there.” She paused. “Well, you can make it hurt if you try to, or sometimes it might hurt you a bit just because it’s a confusing thing to do, like complicated math is, or if the person is an occlumens and resists it, it might hurt both the legilimens and the occlumens. But it’s normally not much different than looking through binoculars. Just, at someone’s mind.”

 

“...what’s an occlumens?” 

 

“Ooooh!” Queenie hopped a bit, clearly excited. “I forgot to tell you about occlumency! It’s what we call the defense against legilimency. It makes your mind kinda feel like concrete to legilimens. Tina’s getting better, but even with her mind closed she’s an open book to me. No one knows you like your twin, after all. I haven’t really been able to practice it any, not many legilimens to practice with, ya know? Hey, maybe this’ll be good for me too! We can help each other.” She bumped Credence with her shoulder. “So, ready to try it now?”

 

He answered her by raising his wand, making eye contact, and saying, “ _ Legilimens. _ ”

 

A moment passed. Nothing happened. “Try it again,” Queenie suggested.

 

“ _ Legilimens. _ ”

 

_ Two girls raced down a New York street, giggling as they wove between the legs of the taller people. A woman chased after them, exhausted and exasperated and waving a bribe of a cookie in the air. The dark haired one, already as serious as he knew her to be now, grabbed her sister’s hand and pulled her into a side street. With a deft flourish of her wand, the girls’ skin and clothes changed to match the brick wall behind them. They struggled to contain their laughter enough to not break the minor illusion until their parents had passed, then raced back down the street the way they’d come. They didn’t stop running when they reached Central Park, didn’t stop when they crossed through the arches of the zoo. Out of breath and still giggling, the pair finally reached their goal, the elephants. Little Tina and Queenie waved at them with their arms held like trunks and tried to copy their sounds. Warmth and joy filled the memory completely, coming from both Queenie and the legilimency she was using on her sister.  _

 

And he was back on the couch on Berk with perfectly in the present Queenie who was smiling like she’d just been elected president. “Yes, Credence, that was perfect! I knew you could do it!”

 

Credence leaned back into the couch and rubbed his temples. “You used legilimency... in the memory I was using legilimency to see...”

 

“Oooh, you noticed that!” Queenie folded her hands, making a visible effort not to bounce with glee. “All my memories are going to have that extra layer. I can’t not use it. Other people’s memories will be a little simpler and won’t give you such a headache.”

 

Credence started. “I didn’t say...”

 

“It’s alright, I’m well acquainted with it. The mind is a complicated thing. Figuring out the insides of someone else’s is bound to mess with your own a bit. You did it wonderfully though.” She gave him a soft smile. “When you’re ready, try it without the wand.”

 

“Do you really think I can?” Credence looked down at the wand he held contemplatively.

 

Queenie pursed her lips in concentration. “I think, that, the wand is good for controlling and directing your magic. But you’re very powerful, even without it. And we don’t have to keep going right now if your head still hurts. Do you want a break?”

 

He did, though the idea of admitting that out loud repulsed him. Instead, he settled on a slight distraction for time. Queenie would understand. “Did you ever try to teach Tina this?”

 

Queenie’s face fell a bit. “I tried. She inclines towards occlumency. And, I think, she doesn’t particularly want to know. And, maybe I didn’t want her to know either... People are... people are people. Words as easy as good and evil don’t even begin to explain it. Most are, for lack of words, more or less neutral. The extreme ones are rare to come across, but they’re like nothing I can explain to someone who hasn’t felt them too. It’s terrifying, sometimes. And Tina has enough to deal with already.”

 

Credence nodded. He looked up at Queenie and opened his mouth to stall again. Instead what came out was, “ _ Legilimens. _ ”

 

_ An apartment, nearly silent. Queenie, now late teens, appeared out of nowhere and Credence realized with a start that she’d walked through where he was standing in the memory. He moved to look at what she was holding. It was a moving picture, framed, with four people all smiling and waving at the camera. Loneliness and grief consumed this memory. Queenie and Tina had placed similar pictures on the dining table and held onto each other, looking wistfully over all of the pictures. Credence noticed that by this point Queenie’s ability had advanced so much that Tina’s emotions and her own were exactly identical, but compounded. He backed away, not wanting to intrude on this particular memory. The feeling of the memory grew thicker, and he couldn’t move, could barely breathe, darkness clouded his vision, creeping in from the corners- _

 

“I’msorryI’msorryI’msor-” Credence was on the ground, arms wrapped around his legs, shaking despite the heat pouring from the fireplace a few feet away. He didn’t remember falling off the couch. 

 

It took another moment for him to notice Queenie, on the floor with him, speaking softly and running her hands through his hair. “-the one about the circus, I’m sorry honey, I got distracted. Shhh, shhh, it’s alright. It’s alright.” 

 

Credence pushed away from her and sat with his back against the couch. “I’m sorry.” It seemed to be all he could say, and he hated that he had nothing else to tell her. 

 

Queenie folded her hands over her lap, letting him retreat. “You were invited. There’s nothing to apologize for. It was my intention to teach you legilimency, and you’re excelling at it. This is good.” Her usual bubbly personality had mostly fallen away. The even, calculating voice she used now felt much more real somehow, and it occurred to Credence that her perfect appearance and behavior must have been crafted from years of responding to unspoken feedback from everyone around her. The idea made his head hurt even more.

 

Queenie handed him a block of ice wrapped in a piece of cloth. He must have been more distracted by his thoughts than he thought he was, he hadn’t noticed her leaving. He pressed the ice to his head as Queenie sat on the floor again and folded her legs underneath her. 

 

“If you’re up to it, one more time. I need you to know some things that you won’t quite get if I try to say them. Alright?” Queenie waited for Credence to nod, wincing as the movement intensified his headache. “We can stop after this. When you’re ready.”

 

Credence set the ice down and looked up at Queenie. He opened his mouth to say the spell, but found himself already inside the memory.

 

_ A platter of teacups fell from Queenie’s hands as she ran from the room. Fear was almost physically pressing in from all around, Tina, the first word he’d heard in the memories. As she pressed on for details, advantages, anything to use, he felt her run across mental concrete. Thicker even than that which had ejected him from the most recent memory, it was dark and nigh impenetrable, defying every prod that Queenie made towards it. She passed it over after a few swipes, moving on to look for others. She marked where it was with the word Graves and changed course to avoid him. Queenie turned upstairs, having pulled the outline of a plan from the scattered thoughts of other familiar, open minds. They moved towards a man Credence didn’t recognize, pulling Jacob by the elbow- _

 

“Mr. Graves is an occlumens?”

 

“You didn’t let me finish.”

 

“I’m sorry.” 

 

“One more time. I have the worst feeling you’ll need to know this before long.” Queenie gave him a tight lipped smile, slowly edging her way back into her usual personality that Credence now recognized as a way to hide. “Last one. I promise.”

 

Whether he was learning too quickly or if Queenie had forcibly shoved the memory at him, or even if that could be done, Credence didn’t know. As he took in his surroundings, he found that how he had gotten into this memory was the last thing he should be concerned with.

 

_ A dark mass hovered overhead, shifting quickly and erratically, seemingly without purpose, destroying everything it touched as easily as a child knocking over a tower of toy bricks. Fear and anger were a near physical presence here, one or the other or both coming from nearly everyone Queenie was listening to. He’d been here before, but this memory looked much different from the ground.  _

 

_ He watched Queenie pull Jacob through a veritable battleground of spells. A few he recognized, most he didn’t. Judging by Tina’s reactions to them, it was better not to know. He was aware of Newt, but Queenie’s interpretation of his mind was murky and he couldn’t feel much beyond general panic. He briefly caught sight of Tina and Mr. Graves, but both vanished soon after. Apparition, he knew, probably to avoid being killed by memory-Credence, who had struck out at them both. He watched himself retreat underground and followed helplessly as Newt and Queenie and Jacob continued after him.  _

 

_ It was quieter in the subway, but the feelings hadn’t gone. They had lessened, though, and much of the smoke surrounding memory-Credence had left. Only a few wisps remained as Newt approached, his voice calm. Now, Credence recognized it as the tone Newt spoke to the creatures with when they were frightened. He wondered how many times the man had almost miraculously calmed a creature that others had called wild and had given up on. Regardless, it had worked on him, he knew from his own memories and Queenie’s. Of course she had been using legilimency from the moment they met. But what had she meant to show him? How terrifying he had appeared that night? He was painfully aware of that already. _

 

_ A frustrated feeling that was incongruent with the memory seeped into his mind, and he realized that it was present Queenie. So, not it then. Just be patient. He could do that. Queenie and Jacob stayed almost out of sight while Newt pulled memory-Credence to his feet. He didn’t want to watch what came next, so he settled down by one of the subway pillars and covered his eyes. Present Queenie didn’t scold him, so he stayed there.  _

 

_ Mental concrete, the same as from the MACUSA memory, came within Queenie’s range. Credence curled in on himself tighter as memory-Credence’s pain and anger and fear returned. Spells were shouted and memory-Credence gave in to the obscurus again and then- _

 

_ A crack in the concrete. Just a little one, but enough. Queenie’s curiosity got the better of her, and in an instant Credence found himself in a different memory, beside Queenie, or at least Queenie’s own mental representation of herself. His head was spinning but present Queenie was so excited, this had to be it, look around! _

 

_ Dead people. At least ten. The man the memory was from stood above them, the lone survivor. Credence didn’t recognize him, but Queenie did. Terror seeped from her mind, accompanied by a single word. Grindelwald. His mind was unlike Queenie’s, dark, despite the fact that Credence could see the sun in the sky. Shadows were everywhere, and Credence was afraid to look in them. He feared what the owner of such a mind would do if he saw, as much as he feared seeing. _

 

_ One of the apparently dead people moved and Credence noticed Mr. Graves for the first time. Badly wounded, but alive. The other one- Grindelwald- approached him as Queenie fled the memory.  _

 

_ Back in Queenie’s memory, Mr. Graves was glaring at her and she was screaming for Tina and then he was on the ground and Newt pushed memory-Credence behind him as a wave of aurors marched forwards and Jacob clicked open the case. _

 

Credence jerked back to the little house on Berk with a gasp, as though he had been drowning a moment ago. As he took in air with deep gulps, it occurred to him that he probably had been holding his breath. “I- I don’t understand.” He didn’t look up from the floor but he heard Queenie shifting beside him, felt her concern. 

 

“A memory within a memory. When you distracted him in the subway he briefly let down his guard. That man we saw, Grindelwald. He’s well known within the wizarding community, but I doubt you’d have heard of him. He wants to do away with the International Statute of Secrecy, and create a world where no-majs are subservient to wizardkind.”

 

Credence sat numbly. This had been a bit too much. “Just like ma said...”

 

Queenie quickly shook her head. “No, Credence. No. He’s an outcast, a criminal. No one wants the magical and non-magical worlds to collide. It would mean war. We just ended one, no one sensible wants another. So many would die, it’s unlikely that the world would ever recover.” She paused, then took a breath and continued. “If that night had gone differently, he might have had his way by now. He went looking for an obscurial. He found you. A man like that, with the sheer power you’ve got... we all got very, very lucky. He’s a more powerful wizard than Newt, Tina, and me all put together.”

 

“He didn’t look like that when I met him though. How did he look different?”

 

“Polyjuice potion. It allows the drinker to assume the appearance of another person temporarily. He must be keeping the real Mr. Graves somewhere.”

 

“Does Tina know?”

 

Queenie hesitated. “No. We wouldn’t be able to do anything about it so I decided not to worry her. She’d just want to tell Seraphina, and she’d never believe us. Newt doesn’t know either, and Jacob wouldn’t know who he is anyways.”

 

“So then why did you tell me?”

 

“Because you needed to know. Memories don’t lie. And I know you’ve started to see that he was not who he presented himself to be, but you needed to know how much deeper that deception ran. He tricked the most powerful and wise witches and wizards in America. He’s still tricking several of them. And you didn’t know about polyjuice or legilimency or any other trick he had available. What happened in New York, it wasn’t your fault. And if we had been less lucky that night, whatever would have happened wouldn’t have been your fault. Grindelwald is an exceptionally powerful and dangerous individual, with the manipulative ability to bring empires to fall.”

 

Credence looked up at her, now almost pleading. “I wouldn’t have hurt anyone. At least, not anyone else... New York was...”

 

“You were angry.” Queenie finished. “At him.”

 

“He couldn’t have made me do it again...”

 

“There’s a spell for that,” Queenie answered apologetically.

 

Credence’s shoulders fell. “Of course there is.”

 

“He can’t find you here.” Queenie rested a hand on his arm. “Now, I think that’s plenty of lessons for today. Maybe a bit too much, I’m sorry sweetie. Why don’t you go talk to your new friend? He’ll be much less negative, I’m sure.”

 

Credence stared at the floor with furrowed brows. “Do you mean Snotlout?”

 

“Yes! Or any of the villagers, really. They all seem pretty nice to me.”

 

The start of a smile ghosted over his lips. “I think I’ll do that...”


	8. Chapter 8

The hatchery was significantly more secure than Newt had been expecting. Despite being located in the hanger, which was for the most part made of wood, the hatchery itself was completely coated in metal, nary a splinter of wood in sight. The patterns of it looked almost natural, like lava, and Newt suspected a few of the hotter burning dragons may have had a part in constructing it. 

 

Inside, after walking through the double door chamber that ensured the hatchery was never exposed to the outside, even as people came and went, were shelves lined with the only cages he’d seen on Berk. Made of metal, unlike the wooden doors of the hanger’s stalls, the cages themselves weren’t actually all that secure at all, as each one only had five sides, and could be removed simply by lifting them off of the eggs. The crisscrossed pattern of the metal strips they were composed of reminded Newt a bit of chicken wire.

 

Valka must have noticed his confusion. “We’ve had a few, well, issues, with dragon hatching. Explosives don’t mesh quite as well with Berk’s wooden construction as they did on my glacier. We have noticed a significant decrease in forest fires since Hiccup built this room and requested all dragon eggs found on Berk and the surrounding islands to be brought here.” She beamed proudly when she spoke of her son.

 

Newt looked around excitedly. There were so many eggs in the hatchery. So many new dragons to meet. And so many questions. “All the eggs? Even wild ones? How do you know when they’re hatching? Doesn’t the temperature matter to incubate them?” His eyes flicked over the eggs, all too beautiful to not be appreciated. One looked to be made of polished marble, another seemed to be sprouting gemstones. Some looked like cacti, and others like globs of lava, glowing red from within. Still others were lumpy and leathery, with spikes jutting out. After nearly becoming dizzy from spinning to look at them all, Newt finally sat down in front of a silver one ringed with uneven horizontal ridges. 

 

Laughing softly at him, Valka sat down too. “Let’s see here,” she ticked the answers on her fingertips. “All the eggs we find, yes. The wild dragons are well enough accustomed to the villagers to allow it. We’ve cared for or rescued a good number of them, and word spreads among dragons. We’ve had a long time to observe several hatchings, and know about how long each species takes. And no, dragon eggs will incubate and hatch regardless of external occurrences. Their shells are deceptively thick.” She pointed to the egg they were looking at. “That one’s a Razorwhip. Those are Deadly Nadders.” She gestured to the eggs with spikes. “And these,” Valka got up and took the cage off of a rather small egg, “are the Terrible Terrors.” She held the egg out to Newt, who cupped it in the palm of his hand delicately. 

 

It was a brilliant red, with darker spots dotting it near the top. Not any bigger than a chicken egg, but it felt much heavier in his hand. Newt carefully turned it over, inspecting for cracks like he’d do with any other egg he came across. Valka watched him while she set down the covering and moved two other Terrible Terror eggs onto the floor in front of him, their coverings still on. She sat down beside him again and waited to have his attention. 

 

Newt turned his head to better expose his ear to Valka, not looking up from the egg. It was body language he’d unintentionally taken from the occamies. Valka seemed to understand it. “These are triplets. Laid ten days ago, we expect them to hatch very soon. Terrible Terrors are quite regular in their timing. I’d recommend putting it back now. The cages are very necessary, as you’ll see.”

 

After replacing the egg under the cage, Newt inspected the other two. Both were the same size as the one Valka had given him, and both had darker patches near the top as the other one did. One was a beautiful fuschia color and the other a bright marigold. Newt couldn’t help the growing excitement he felt. He’d seen dragon eggs hatch before, but never in such a practiced and organized manner as there was on Berk. And there was an entirely new species he was about to meet! 

 

“Do you how many species there are on the archipelago?” Newt kept his eyes on the eggs, again only slightly tilting his head to address Valka. 

 

She hadn’t noticed, as her attention was likewise held captive by the eggs. “Hundreds. Maybe thousands. We haven’t found them all yet. It’s one of Hiccup’s pet projects”

 

“I think it’s amazing that people can live and work so closely with them without conflict. I can’t imagine this working where I’m from,” Newt told her sadly.

 

He was a bit surprised to hear Valka laugh. “Neither could we, until recently. Until Hiccup and Toothless proved cooperation was possible, Berk was constantly fighting the dragons. That was only about five years ago.”

 

“Five years,” Newt repeated with a hushed sense of awe. “All this in five years?” He looked around again at the hatchery, itself a testament to how ingrained dragons were to Berk’s way of living. “Maybe there is hope for us after all.”

 

“I’d like to think there’s hope for everyone to come to terms with each other. If ten years ago I’d been told Berk would be this way, I don’t think I would have believed it. I scarcely believed it when my son came to tell me, riding on a dragon!” Valka smiled fondly. “We’ve all come a very long way. A very long way indeed.” She sat up straighter and pointed to the fuschia egg. “Look! They’re hatching!”

 

A crack had indeed appeared in that particular egg’s shell, and Newt unconsciously leaned towards it. The egg shivered, the crack widened, and the sound of an explosion echoed around the hatchery. Two identical ones followed immediately after from the other eggs. Bits of eggshell, on fire, burst through the cages, though most of the debris stayed contained. 

 

With his ears ringing, it took Newt some time to realize Valka was speaking. “-quite so overkill now, hmm?” She lifted up the corner of one cage and a tiny reptile, not much larger than a Fireworm, scurried out. She picked it up and held it out for Newt to see.

 

He took it as gently as he’d taken the egg, and let the creature run across his hands as he shifted them to catch it when it had nowhere else to go. It was the yellow one, the darker shade accenting its wings and dorsal spines. Its eyes seemed a bit too big for its head, and its wings were crumpled like a butterfly immediately out of its cocoon, half extended, as though it was already trying to figure out how to use them. 

 

“It’s beautiful,” Newt said in a soft voice. The dragon paused at the noise to look at him, then resumed its endless trek. 

 

“It’s a girl,” Valka told him, inspecting the red one she’d picked up. “So’s this one.” Still holding the red dragon in one hand, she flipped the cage of the fuschia one up and grabbed the dragon before it could find somewhere in the hatchery to hide. “And this one is... a boy.” She giggled and set the two babies on Newt’s leg. 

 

He held still and brought his hands down so the first could climb off. She rushed to join her siblings. The red dragon was a bit bigger than the other two, and seemed the least curious about its surroundings. They climbed over and around each other for a good minute before one of them fell off Newt’s leg and the other two realized they could as well. 

 

They watched the hatchling dragons rush almost blindly around the room. Valka replaced the cages on the shelves. Quite a few bits of eggshell hadn’t completely burnt up, and the Terrible Terrors nibbled on this whenever they stumbled across it. 

 

With the hatchery looking much like it had before the triplets hatched, Valka proceeded to round up the hatchlings. She handed the red one to Newt and nodded for him to get the door. 

 

“So, where are we going?” Newt asked, pushing open the first heavy door with his shoulder.

 

Valka readjusted her grip on the two Terrible Terrors and followed him outside. “Oh, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.”

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

“So, um, what am I supposed to be feeding him again?” Jacob asked. 

 

Fishlegs patted Gingerbread fondly. “Well, fish and other meat sources are a given. And anything you’d eat is probably fine too! And metal, but he’ll cough that back up once it melts. Very useful for forging things. Basically, whatever. Except blue ollivander, that’s poisonous to dragons. But anything else!” He released the catapult and a felled tree was launched towards sea. Meatlug and Gingerbread both sprang after it.

 

“Uh, will they eat that?” Jacob asked, staring after the tree.

 

Fishlegs laughed. “No, not usually. Would you like to eat solid wood?”

 

“I don’t think I would,” Jacob conceded with a laugh. The tree slowly rose into view as the two dragons hauled it back up the cliffside and returned it to the catapult. 

 

“Good girl,” Fishlegs crooned, patting Meatlug proudly. “You taught your little friend so well! Yes you did!” The dragon rubbed its head into his belly, wiggling happily as he continued praising it.

 

Jacob nodded at Gingerbread. “That was very impressive. You got the log real good.” Gingerbread rolled onto his back and looked up at Jacob as best he could. Jacob knelt down to rub his belly. “What a good dragon you are.”

 

Fishlegs looked up at Jacob as if lightning had struck him. “Oh. Oh that could be interesting.” 

 

Jacob and the two dragons stared at him curiously. Finally, Jacob asked, “...um, what could be interesting?”

 

Fishlegs rubbed his hands together excitedly. “Well, you see, we were talking about food and that made me think. We’ve used fire from stoker class dragons and Toothless to cook food in a pinch, but they’re so powerful it burns the food up. We’ve kind of just decided that dragon flames are too hot for it. But!” He looked at the other three in turn, waiting for anticipation to build. “We’ve never tried it with boulder class dragons before!”

 

Jacob slowly raised his hand. Fishlegs nodded encouragingly at him. “This idea sounds neat, and all, but um... do gronkles actually do the whole fire thing?”

 

Fishlegs gasped. “Has Gingerbread not done that yet? Whoa.” He waved excitedly to Meatlug, who turned towards the ocean and spat out a fireball. It sailed for about 50 yards before exploding like a firework. 

 

Jacob slowly nodded and turned back to Fishlegs. “Well, okay then. What did you have in mind?”

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

It seemed especially sunny outside to Credence, or perhaps that was just the tail end of his headache. He didn’t know where Snotlout was, but he reasoned that he’d have to be somewhere on the island. With possible trouble headed their way, Hiccup would have kept the riders close to home. 

 

It occurred to him that he could probably use magic to find him, but Credence wasn’t too keen on trying any spells, especially not without another magical person around. Tina, Queenie, and Newt all avoided using magic. And with good reason, if these people didn’t take to it, they’d have nowhere to go. Again. 

 

The lesson with Queenie had helped some, but he was always aware of his magic clawing at his insides, desperately trying to escape. Sometimes it had. Rather explosively. Since he’d met the others, it was as if a hole had been drilled in the dam keeping his magic in check. It happened often now, in ways that were more normal, according to Tina and Queenie and Newt, even if he couldn’t always control it. The obscurus had behaved. 

 

The magic lessons felt more like a patch than a solution, but it was better than nothing. Far better. Newt had tried to talk to him about it once, but the mere mention of the obscurus had practically summoned it. They agreed to not discuss it anymore, with the condition that Credence would tell him if it got any worse. If he’d been completely truthful, Credence would have said that if it got worse, the obscurus could tell him itself. But he’d wanted the conversation over. 

 

Distracted, Credence didn’t notice the old man until he had walked into him. “I’m - I’m sorry!” Credence yelped, stooping down to pick up the pile of sticks the man had dropped.

 

The man gave Credence a once over and snatched the sticks out of his hands. “Ah don’t want no help from you! You’re one ah them,” he hissed, glaring at Credence.

 

He really hadn’t intended to look in the man’s mind. But he’d seemed so angry at him and Credence wanted to know why. The spell hadn’t crossed his tongue when Credence found himself inside the man’s head.

 

Mildew hated change. He’d hated the dragons, and the construction to accommodate them, and the way his sheep were no longer the most important animals on Berk. But everyone else loved the dragons. They hated him for hating them, nevermind that five years ago they were the enemy. 

 

And now there were new people. From somewhere no one had heard of or cared about, unfamiliar with the Viking way of life, unestablished as useful citizens of Berk, it was fine to hate them. He might even be able to turn the village against them, it would be easy enough, they were clumsy idiots, the lot of them. Perhaps one might leave the hatchery door open, ignite the hanger. This boy looked dumb enough to blame, look at him staring blankly...

 

Credence snapped back to himself at the reminder that this wasn’t Queenie, he had to at least try to act normal, but his thoughts were spinning at a million miles an hour and the pure viciousness rolling off of Mildew made him close his eyes and physically step back...

 

...onto rock. Hadn’t he been standing on dirt just a second ago? 


	9. Chapter 9

Berk was such a lovely place. It was filled with things she didn’t know and people she hadn’t met. Around every corner was something new to learn, or to stumble across, Queenie mused, eyeing the green tail that was poorly concealed behind a rock. 

 

Muffled noises behind the rock rose in volume as she approached, the owners of the voices evidently not yet aware of her. “No, no, I’m telling you Tuff, the Deathsong sounded more like oooOOOoaooOOo. It was definitely not like OooooaooOOOOwAo!” 

 

The twins sat on their dragon’s necks, talking to each other in a conspiratorial hush. Queenie peeked around the rock they were hiding behind and waited for them to notice her. Ruffnut did first, and nudged her brother, who was in the midsts of defending his point. They both turned to look at her, vaguely guilty expressions on their faces. “Whatever it was, it’s her fault,” Tuffnut started, pointing at his sister.

 

“Hey!” Ruffnut yelped, swiping at him with the rolled up length of bark she was holding.

 

Queenie held up her hands placatingly. “Sorry to interrupt, I couldn’t help but overhear a bit. Could you tell me more about this Deathsong?”

 

The twin’s minds told her before they did. A truly enormous dragon, whose voice held the power of enchantment, and whose amber attacks had backed the riders into a corner more than once before. “It’s just-” Ruffnut started off.

 

“-some dragon,” Tuffnut ended, leaning against Belch’s head as casually as he could manage. The two dragon heads rolled their eyes and shared a glance with each other. 

 

Queenie smiled at them as sweetly as she could manage. “And it sounds kind of like oooowwoooaaaaaaoowo?” She pulled the sound from their memories and sang it back to them. Both twins jumped to their feet, mouths agape.

 

“Oh. My-”

 

“YES!” Ruffnut clasped her hands over her mouth, aware that the yell had been too loud for what they were doing. “Yes that’s perfect can you do it again?”

 

Queenie obliged, singing as much of the song as the twins remembered. They exchanged a glance and looked back to Queenie with mischief written on their faces. 

 

“So...” Tuffnut edged his way over to stand by Queenie.

 

“Wanna help us pull a prank?” Ruffnut earned a glare from her brother for cutting him off, but both quickly turned their attention back to Queenie. 

 

She pretended to consider this. “Would this prank have anything to do with imitating a Deathsong in order to scare someone?” 

 

The twins nodded eagerly. Queenie laughed, and nodded in return. “Alright! That sounds like fun. Lead the way!” 

 

The twins sandwiched Queenie between them, each throwing an arm around her shoulders. “You won’t regret this,” Ruffnut promised. 

 

“Well, unless we get chased by Astrid. Then you might regret it a little,” Tuffnut added.

 

“But it’s so worth it!” they sighed in unison. Queenie giggled and allowed herself to be led away to find someone to scare, the twins’ rather conspicuous dragon trailing behind.

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

“So, in retrospect, Hiccup might be rubbing off on me a little.” Fishlegs stood with Jacob looking at what appeared to be a wooden crate. They’d spent a little under an hour constructing the contraction. Ultimately, it was a simple idea. They would place whatever needed to be cooked flat against the bottom of the crate, then they would add a metal box, open at the top, so that there would be a few inches of clearance at each edge. Then, they’d add more things to cook around the box and wedge planks of wood over that so the outer edge was sealed and the interior of the metal box was exposed. To cook what was inside, a gronkle would spit molten metal into the metal box. 

 

Fishlegs had been very picky about the metal. As he had explained, the metal box would have to be slower to melt than the metal the gronkles used, or the container would melt and the food would be ruined. Finally he had settled on titanium from the exterior and zinc for the interior. 

 

Jacob personally thought the whole idea was rather disgusting, but the gronkle spit wouldn’t actually touch the food, and after traveling with Newt and company for a while, it was far from the weirdest thing he’d participated in. 

 

So, with their strange sort of oven loaded with fish and vegetables and Meatlug contentedly melting down the offered zinc, they waited, Gingerbread pacing about in front of them. The silence bothered Jacob. 

 

“How’d you and Meatlug meet?” He’d always been able to get Newt to ramble at length about his adventures, and occasionally misadventures, by asking a similar question about any creature in the case.

 

Fishlegs’s face grew slack. “Well, um, you see... Hiccup needed help and so we needed to fly, and Meatlug was there and that’s not super important we’re a team now!”

 

“Whoa, that was even more dodgy than when Newt told me how his runespoor tried to eat him,” Jacob laughed. Noting Fishlegs’s expression, he decided to drop the subject. “So, is Meatlug about ready?”

 

Fishlegs excitedly shifted his weight from one foot to another. “Yeah, she is! Any second now!”

 

They turned their attention to the dragon, who self-consciously moved so the box was between her and them. “Aww, it’s okay, girl! Gingerbread and Jacob are friends!” Fishlegs called to her encouragingly. A gurgling sound came from the dragon, and then an arc of molten metal sprung from behind the crate like a fountain. It sputtered and died a moment later. 

 

Fishlegs and Jacob crept forward uncertainly. To their surprise, most of the metal had in fact gotten in the box. “Good girl!” Fishlegs crooned. “That was so good!” Meatlug sat as best she could and stared up with an expectant expression Jacob had grown familiar with. “Treats in just a minute,” Fishlegs promised.

 

When they could no longer stand the smell coming from the unusual oven, they pulled the planks of wood out and checked the food inside. 

 

“It’s perfect,” Jacob said in amazement. 

 

“Oh, cool,” Fishlegs squealed. He pulled a few fish out and tossed them to the gronkles. “Enjoy! This wouldn’t be possible without you.”

 

The dragons happily dug into the fish. Jacob and Fishlegs passed food out to the villagers who’d gathered to watch the experiment. There was only a bit left by the time everyone had left, and they munched on it while discussing other uses for the thing. 

 

“Hey, Fishlegs, how are we gonna get the zinc out? You know, to use it again?” Jacob asked.

 

Fishlegs froze in mid-celebration. “Oh, I did not think this through did I...” The now useless cooking contraption sat in front of them almost smugly. 

 

Meatlug bumped her nose into his knee, bits of fish still stuck on her face. “Thanks, girl,” Fishlegs sighed. 

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

Before Credence opened his eyes, he knew he’d apparated. The air felt thick with lightning and sea spray rained down viciously, drenching him. Something moved to his left, scales scraping against rock. Shaking, Credence slowly forced himself to look at the Skrill dead on.

 

It was bigger than most of Berk’s dragons, about the size of Cloudjumper. Unlike Cloudjumper, this dragon was circling around Credence like he’d seen cats do to the rats of New York just before pouncing. He stumbled backwards but lost his footing on the slick rock and fell. 

 

Frozen, Credence watched helplessly as the dragon drew nearer and wisps of darkness separated from his skin. He shook his head vehemently, trying desperately to withdraw them. Being eaten by a dragon wouldn’t be nearly as bad as destroying Berk. He had to stay in control.

 

Credence forced his breathing to slow and looked the dragon over, trying to see what Newt would notice if he were here. Newt would be able to get out of this alive, without hurting anyone. Newt would also be able to apparate at will. He also wouldn’t be at risk of turning into an explosive magical monster...

 

The dragon was dark, as though the light around it was warped. Probably because of the electricity it was about to use to kill him. What little he could see of it was purple, like the lightning that was striking randomly through the air now. Thin long spikes that each looked like they could easily skewer a cow extended from its head and ran down its back. Its tail whipped back and forth in time with the rise and fall of its feet, which were tipped with claws that wouldn’t have been out of place on a demon. Its wings were pulled tight against its front legs- no, not quite, one sagged lower than the other. He met the dragon’s eyes, positively glowing with electricity. 

 

His wing hurt. Wait, no, he didn’t have wings. The dragon had wings. Credence was using legilimency. Legilimency worked on the dragon? It hurt so much... Humans had hurt his wing. He hated humans. No, he was a human. She hated humans. The dragon. No, she didn’t hate humans, she feared them. And there was one on her rock. He would hurt her, he had to go, humans could not be trusted. Her wing hurt.

 

Almost instinctively, Credence raised his hand towards the damaged wing. His stolen wand was still on Berk, tucked away in Newt’s case, and he spoke no words, but magic flowed between the pair nonetheless. 

 

Still snarling, rows of razor teeth inches from his outstretched hand, the dragon halted in shock. She cautiously extended the wing -it didn’t hurt!- then fanned it up and down experimentally, though the rest of her body remained stock still, even the leg to which the wing was attached. She turned her head to look at the wing as she continued to raise and lower it. The deafening cracks of energy surrounding the creature calmed somewhat as the dragon backed away from Credence, confusion positively radiating off of her.

 

She sat back on her haunches and tilted her head inquisitively at him. “Um, so, are... are we good?” Credence asked. Still on the ground, he stayed as motionless as he could. The dragon stared at him, her tail flicking up sporadically. Both watched each other silently for long enough to unnerve Credence. Shadowy wisps spun around him agitatedly. The dragon lowered her front feet back to the ground and pawed inquisitively at them. Where shadow and electricity touched, small shockwaves rattled the air. Credence covered his ears and the dragon backed away again.

 

She cautiously crept forward again when nothing further happened, sniffing the air like a dog. She bumped Credence with her nose and bounced away at the large resultant shockwave. The noise she made was much like the chuffing sounds Newt’s Nundu made when it had successfully tricked someone into thinking that its tail was another creature. Credence’s eyes widened as he realized she was playing. Newt had said that all the creatures he’d met do, but seeing the wild, supposedly vicious, Skrill display the same behavior patterns as Newt’s much tamer animals was an entirely new experience.

 

Concentrating hard, Credence pushed a few wisps towards the dragon, one at a time. She stood on her back legs, tail whipping wildly for balance, and batted at them with her front legs like a child popping bubbles. Surprise and joy flowed from her. The emotions felt like physical warmth to Credence. When the wisps were gone she fell back to all fours and looked hopefully at him with a soft whine. He shook his head, too calm now to be in any danger of smoking out.

 

The Skrill snorted and lept into the air with a powerful downward stroke that splashed even more sea water on Credence. He rubbed the water from his eyes and stared after her as she grew smaller in the sky. 

 

Credence lay down on the dark rocks and tried to even out his breathing like Tina had shown him. After a few minutes he sat back up and looked around, realizing for the first time that he was trapped on the island. “Guess I’ll just wait then,” he mumbled to one.

 

He pushed himself to his feet and looked around for any of the fishing boats Berk had sent out that morning. No boats were in the immediate area, though a dark shape in the sky was quickly growing...

 

Credence stepped back towards the edge of the rock to give the dragon room to land. Maybe it was a Rider and they’d take him back to Berk. Or at least a wild dragon like Jack. Tina had done alright with Jack...

 

The dragon landed, purple electricity heralding her return. The Skrill held a large cut of sheepskin in her mouth, obviously stolen from someone on Berk. She looked expectantly at Credence and dropped the sheepskin. 

 

“What else do you want from me?” Credence asked the dragon, exasperated. “I can’t make a sheep out of that. I’m not that magical.”

 

The dragon snorted and picked up the sheepskin again before tossing it over her back, covering a few of the dorsal spines near her head that she had laid flat against her back. She looked back to Credence with the same expectant expression in her eyes. He didn’t know if he was actually using legilimency again by accident or if her meaning was simply obvious enough he didn’t need it. 

 

“No. No, no, no,” Credence moved to step backwards and realized that he was already at the edge of the rock. The very small rock, which would probably get smaller when the tide came in. That all the villagers of Berk had been instructed to stay away from and would remain away from for a while after the Skrill left. He sighed. “I guess I’ll just have to have faith in you...” 

 

Bright ripples of energy coursed through the dragon and she hopped forwards. Credence took a deep breath and climbed onto her back, gripping the spines that jutted out of her skull. She took off in the same manner she had before and Credence felt his heart drop into his stomach. This had been a terrible, terrible idea.

 

He clung to spikes in front of his face as the tiny outcropping of rock shrank beneath them. The Skrill brought them into the air with smooth steady beats of bat like wings, which would have been more confidence inspiring if each upstroke didn’t send out bolts of electricity. The heavily charged air made it fairly difficult to breathe, and the ever increasing altitude wasn’t helping any.

 

She was fast. Faster than the winds he’d harnessed to bring them here, faster than the trains that whistled through New York’s stations. He was sure that they’d look like real lightning to people watching below. 

 

But there was no one below. He could see the sea beneath them, featureless and cold, and no islands anywhere in sight. He craned around, trying to spot Berk, but nearly fell and decided he’d just have to hang on and trust the Skrill. He didn’t have much other choice.

 

She dipped low in the sky, so low that Credence thought she might still be hurt. A flash of panic coursed through him, maybe he hadn’t healed her wing after all. He was so inexperienced, so out of control with his magic- 

 

But she pulled up short before plunging into the ocean. They glided just over the surface of the sea until she twisted into a turn so that the tip of one wing just barely brushed the water. Water erupted upwards where she’d hit it, some splashing the pair as she straightened up again and repeated the maneuver to the other side. Fountains of spray marked their winding path as the Skrill sped on. 

 

For some reason he couldn't quite name, Credence was almost disappointed to see an island on the horizon. The Skrill sped towards it and let the natural slope of the island push her upwards again, only slowing when she reached the top of a snowy mountain peak. 

 

She landed heavily amongst the snow, sending heaps of it up into the air. She danced around and snapped her jaws at it as it fell back to earth, then turned her head back to see if her new companion was as delighted with her home as she was. 

 

Already cold and soaked from their adventures, Credence was shaking head to toe before he’d even slid off her back into the snow. He immediately regretted doing so and stood up to try and distance himself from the cold. The Skrill hummed and looked him over, concern evident in her movements. His skin was turning light blue and Credence tried to resist the wave of panic that hit him when he realized his fingers weren’t moving at all. 

 

“I- I can’t stay here,” he tried explain to the dragon. “Take me back to Berk. Please?” The dragon immediately recoiled, evidently recognizing Berk. Credence didn’t have it in him to try and figure out where she’d heard it from. He was concentrating all his energy on trying to force his apparition to work the way it was supposed to. 

 

Credence wasn’t sure when he’d fallen, but he was facedown in the snow. He tried to sit up but found that none of his limbs obeyed him at all. Teeth dug into his torso. Credence’s last thought was that at least he was too numb to feel the dragon eat him.


	10. Chapter 10

Valka had brought him to a paradise. Newt spun around slowly, trying to count how many terrible terrors there were in the tower. As they flew around above his head, he gave up and simply watched them. 

The tiny dragons came in every color he could imagine and then some. Most looked to be bright jewel tones, but duller shades were mixed in as well. The red dragon wiggled in his hands and Newt released her. She flew up to a perch where a few adult dragons were nesting and snuggled comfortably up against them. She was soon joined by her fuchsia and marigold counterparts. Valka waved to them as they settled in.

“This is incredible,” Newt whispered, still spinning to look at them all.

Valka smiled to herself. Watching Newt discover new dragons was fast becoming a great source of joy for her. “They’re messengers. They have a remarkable sense of smell, and are very good at associating names with smells. It helps that they enjoy showing off. If you tell them who to take a message to, they’ll find them, out to a hundred and fifty miles, as far as we’ve tested.”

“Incredible,” Newt repeated. A few terrible terrors stared down at him and he nodded to them. They quickly pretended not to notice him. He moved a bit closer to a few of the dragons near eye level. “Is this as big as they get?” He reached out to touch one of their wings, but was growled at and withdrew his hand.

“Yes.” Valka extended a hand, palm up, and a bright green dragon swooped down to perch on it. She moved her arm towards Newt. 

He looked it over, noting a few differences between the babies and the adult version. “They’re beautiful.”

Valka nearly doubled over laughing, and the disgruntled dragon flew off. “I’m sorry, I’m-” she gave another wheeze of laughter, then began to collect herself. “I’ve never heard someone call a terrible terror beautiful before.”

“They are!” Newt protested, arms crossing a bit defensively. 

“I know.” Valka looked over this strange man again. It certainly was nice to have a fresh face around Berk. “I think I’m rather glad you landed on our island, mister Newton Artemis Fido Scamander from England.” A spark of mischief glimmered in her eyes. “Why don’t we head back to the Hall to eat, and then I can show you the training arena?” 

Newt jumped at the offer. “Training arena? What sort of things do you train the dragons? How many dragons-” He stopped, feeling an unfamilar weight in his pocket. 

The fuschia dragon had slipped inside and was hissing at Pickett, who was trying his best to gouge out the little dragon’s eyes. Newt picked both of them up and swung them away from each other. “None of that now.” He set the dragon down on the first perch he could reach. No sooner than he did, Newt felt a weight land on his shoulder and turned his head to see the red dragon flicking her tail over the top of his arm, with her wings spread out and waving happily. He didn’t need to see the one nesting in his hair to know it was yellow.

Newt sighed while Valka burst into another fit of giggles. “I think you and your friend might just have to get used to them for a while.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.” Newt returned Pickett to his pocket and held out an elbow for the fuschia dragon to climb on to. “I believe you suggested food?”

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

They were not very well concealed, mostly owing to Barf and Belch’s size, but Snotlout hadn’t noticed them creeping behind the house. Ruffnut handed Queenie the roll of bark and indicated that she should use it as a loudspeaker. Both twins giggled in anticipation, peering around the corner with Queenie.

Snotlout was sharpening a sword and occasionally swinging it about, resting against Hookfang, who might have been asleep. Tuffnut nudged Queenie to go on.

She brought the bark up to her lips and made her Deathsong imitation noise. Snotlout leapt to his feet and swung the sword at the sky, screaming. Hookfang startled awake and attempted to dive into the nearest house for cover. He got stuck in the narrow door frame and began to thrash his tail around wildly, just barely missing Snotlout more than once.

The twins were rolling on the ground and clutching their stomachs, both howling with laughter. Snotlout heard them and marched towards their hiding place. The first of the twins to their feet grabbed Queenie’s hand and pulled her away. “Now we run!”

And run they did, through the entire town with a sword wielding Snotlout at their heels. Hookfang eventually freed himself and joined the chase, but Queenie had gotten away from the twins by then and was contentedly making her way away from all the fuss. She casually ditched the roll of bark through a window when she was sure no one was looking. It had been a fun adventure, Queenie thought to herself. She really ought to seek out the twins more often.

A bright purple streak interrupted her musings, as did several screams when it landed a few streets away. Vikings rushed past her, running away from it, some shutting themselves up in their houses and closing up the windows, and others running back once they had acquired some sort of weaponry. Queenie turned and made her way in that direction. This would be worth seeing for herself. 

 

⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧⤧

 

Tina elbowed her way through the crowd of nervous Vikings circling the forge, more than half of whom were holding weapons. Several dragons circled overhead or sat perched on the roof of the forge. The Vikings moved easily enough for her, as she was the only person going forwards. 

Jack wasn’t able to nose through the crowd and became stuck amongst the people, unable to take off, so when Tina burst into the circle of open space the Vikings had given the dragon, she found herself alone. 

It was monstrous, perhaps not huge, but sharp at every edge. Its spines on its back were tilted forwards into attack mode. Lightning cracked around it, intensifying when Tina stepped forwards. Its tail whipped slowly back and forth over an unconscious figure. Credence. Blood pooled around him and dripped from the thing’s teeth and Tina’s wand was in her hand before she was conscious of drawing it. 

The dragon snarled low and the Vikings backed away further and a litany of spells sprung to Tina’s mind, and then there was a hand wrapped around hers and her wand was lowering and the dragon was still snarling but now its spines tipped lower and the lightning stilled. Newt tugged Tina away and she reluctantly took a few steps away. 

“I think your skrill is feeling better, Hiccup,” a woman, Valka, called out. The skrill turned to look at her, backing deeper into the forge, curling itself tighter above Credence. It was a motion she’d seen before. Newt’s niffler did the same thing when someone reached for its gold. It was defensive. 

Tina took a deep breath and moved forward again, slipping out of Newt’s grasp. She put her wand away and held out her hands slowly. “Don’t be afraid. We want to help.” The dragon kept its gaze fixed firmly on her but didn’t back away any further. 

She pushed forwards steadily, talking softly. If it worked on an enrumpt, surely it would work on the skrill. It shifted uncomfortably but didn’t growl anymore. Tina could almost touch it. The electricity surrounding it made her hair stand on end. She slowly dropped to her knees and reached for Credence. 

The dragon shoved its head in between them, lips pulled back in a snarl so its full set of teeth were visible. Tina held her breath and stayed still. They stared at each other for a moment before the skrill whined and sat back on its hind legs. Tina reached for Credence, acutely aware of the wicked sharp claws above them. 

He was cold. Absolutely freezing. Tina pulled him close to her and rubbed his arm, trying to warm him up. If she could just use magic...

The dragon dropped back down and circled them, rubbing up against them when it could. Tina tried to ignore it, and the sparks it sent dancing and popping around them. She focused on finding when Credence was bleeding from. It didn’t take much looking. A row of triangular wounds stretched from the bottom of his ribs to the top of his hips. She felt for the corresponding places on his back and found similar wounds there. 

So what had happened? Credence had been somewhere very cold, maybe apparated there on accident. The skrill had picked him up and brought him back here. Specifically, to the forge. The warmest place on Berk by far. And they’d all treated it as a threat. 

Tina looked up to find the dragon looking down at her. “Thank you,” she whispered. It finally stopped pacing and lay down, the end of its spiked tail wrapped around Tina. Its body shielded them from the sight of the villagers, for which Tina was grateful. She quickly pulled her wand out and murmured a few healing spells. It wasn’t perfect, but it would help. 

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Newt and Valka talking to Hiccup. She didn’t have to hear them to know what they were saying. How many times had Newt warned her about overcrowding a creature that had obviously had bad experiences with humans? It was why only one person aside from Newt could sit near the fwooper, and why the bowtruckles only barely tolerated him. It was amazing that the skrill had let her near at all. It must have known it couldn’t help Credence on its own.

She looked down at him, worried. He was warmer now, but still deathly pale. Queenie had always been better at healing magic, she’d just have to get Credence to her somehow. 

Hiccup had somehow gotten the crowd to disperse. As they left, a certain small green dragon burst from his temporary captivity and bolted for the skrill. It backed away and batted its tail at the incoming Jack with a screech. Jack crashed into a wall inside the forge, and a man stepped out from behind it, several limbs replaced with hooks or other utensils. 

He charged at the dragon, a morning star held above his head. The skrill lowered its head underneath the man, extended the spines ringing its head, and lifted up to send the man sailing through the air. 

Credence shifted in Tina’s arms. He didn’t seem to immediately realized when he was. He looked around with bleary eyes at the chaos surrounding them, only reacting when he noticed the skrill. He struggled to sit up, and eventually gave up and collapsed back against Tina. 

The movement was enough to catch the dragon’s attention. It returned to circling them, and after a few rotations it laid down and set its head on Credence’s lap. It hummed and closed its eyes while he stroked the base of its spines until they lay flat. 

The skrill was a rather unintimidating sight when it was resting. The cracks of electricity in the air died off as it drew its spines against itself, and soon it would have been easy to mistake it for a domesticated dragon instead of the wild animal that had been on such a rampage moments ago. 

Jack approached it slowly, more cautious this time. He circled around to stand behind Tina and peeked over her shoulder. Somewhere behind her Hiccup was asking someone named Gobber if he was alright. Tina shook Credence a little. “I think we’ll be able to help you better at the house.” 

He didn’t answer, on the verge of unconsciousness again. Tina shoved the dragon and it snapped to attention as though it hadn’t almost been asleep. “Help,” she stated simply. The dragon held itself low to the ground and Tina pushed Credence onto its back. It stood up, remarkably gently for such a creature, and allowed Tina and Jack to steer it away from the center of the village.

**Author's Note:**

> If you have scene requests, my tumblr wishuponadragon is probably an easier way to let me know!


End file.
